Syndicating ultrasound echo data in a healthcare environment

ABSTRACT

Disclosed herein are systems and methods for syndication and management of structured and unstructured data to assist institutional healthcare delivery, healthcare providers&#39; practices, healthcare providers&#39; group practices, collaborative academic research and decision making in healthcare, including through the utilization of medical devices and healthcare pools.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No.11/346,587 filed in Feb. 1, 2006, which is a continuation-in-part ofU.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/223,826, filed on Sep. 10, 2005,each of which is incorporated by reference in its entirety.

This application also claims the benefit of the following commonly ownedU.S. Provisional Applications, either directly or through one or more ofthe above utility applications, or both. Each of the following andforegoing applications is incorporated by reference in its entirety.

Ser. No. 60/649,311, filed on Feb. 1, 2005, and entitled DATA STREAMMANAGEMENT.

Ser. No. 60/649,312, filed on Feb. 1, 2005, and entitled DATA STREAMMANAGEMENT SOFTWARE.

Ser. No. 60/649,504, filed on Feb. 2, 2005, and entitled RSS MEDIAPROCESSING SYSTEMS.

Ser. No. 60/649,502, filed on Feb. 2, 2005, and entitled SEMANTICPROCESSING.

Ser. No. 60/657,840, filed on Mar. 1, 2005, and entitled USER INTERFACESAND WORKFLOWS FOR USE WITH DATA STREAM MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS.

Ser. No. 60/594,298, filed on Mar. 26, 2005, and entitled USES OFMETADATA IN A STRUCTURED DATA FEED ENVIRONMENT.

Ser. No. 60/594,416, filed on Apr. 6, 2005, and entitled DATA STREAMMANAGEMENT.

Ser. No. 60/669,666, filed on Apr. 8, 2005, and entitled DATA STREAMMANAGEMENT.

Ser. No. 60/594,456, filed on Apr. 10, 2005, and entitled FUNCTIONALSEARCH OUTLINES.

Ser. No. 60/594,478, filed on Apr. 12, 2005, and entitled DATA STREAMMANAGEMENT.

Ser. No. 60/673,661, filed on Apr. 20, 2005, and entitled DATA STREAMMANAGEMENT.

Ser. No. 60/680,879, filed on May 13, 2005, and entitled DATA STREAMSECURITY SYSTEMS.

Ser. No. 60/684,092, filed on May 23, 2005, and entitled FUNCTIONALSEARCH OUTLINES.

Ser. No. 60/685,904, filed on May 31, 2005, and entitled WIRELESSDELIVERY OF RSS CONTENT.

Ser. No. 60/686,630, filed on Jun. 2, 2005, and entitled DATA STREAMADVERTISING.

Ser. No. 60/688,826, filed on Jun. 9, 2005, and entitled USES OFOUTLINES AND STRUCTURED DATA.

Ser. No. 60/694,080, filed on Jun. 24, 2005, and entitled USES OF LISTS,OUTLINES AND STRUCTURED DATA.

Ser. No. 60/695,029, filed on Jun. 28, 2005, and entitled EVALUATION OFDATA FEED CONTENT.

Ser. No. 60/699,631, filed on Jul. 15, 2005, and entitled OPML SEARCHENGINES AND SUPERSERVICES.

Ser. No. 60/700,122, filed on Jul. 18, 2005, and entitled WEBSUPERSERVICES.

Ser. No. 60/702,467, filed on Jul. 26, 2005, and entitled VERTICALMARKETS AND FEATURES FOR ENHANCED WEB SYSTEMS.

Ser. No. 60/703,688, filed on Jul. 29, 2005, and entitled OPML SYSTEMS.

Ser. No. 60/703,535, filed on Jul. 29, 2005, and entitled OPMLCONVERTER.

Ser. No. 60/703,544, filed on Jul. 29, 2005, and entitled OPML SEARCHENGINE.

Ser. No. 60/709,683, filed on Aug. 19, 2005, and entitled USERINTERFACES FOR OPML SEARCH ENGINES.

Ser. No. 60/719,073, filed on Sep. 21, 2005, and entitled WEBSUPERSERVICES.

Ser. No. 60/719,283, filed on Sep. 21, 2005, and entitled HEALTH CAREINFORMATION MANAGEMENT.

Ser. No. 60/719,284, filed on Sep. 21, 2005, and entitled OPML ROUTERS.

Ser. No. 60/720,250, filed on Sep. 22, 2005, and entitled BEHAVIORALMETADATA IN SYNDICATION AND STRUCTURED DATA ENVIRONMENTS.

Ser. No. 60/721,803, filed on Sep. 28, 2005, and entitled WEBSUPERSERVICES.

Ser. No. 60/722,021, filed on Sep. 29, 2005, and entitled INFORMATIONPOOLS.

Ser. No. 60/724,956, filed on Oct. 7, 2005, and entitled HEATH CAREINFORMATION MANAGEMENT.

Ser. No. 60/725,166, filed on Oct. 7, 2005, and entitled COMPUTERPROGRAMS FOR SEARCH, MANAGEMENT, AND USE OF OUTLINES.

Ser. No. 60/726,542, filed on Oct. 14, 2005, and entitled RSS ENABLEDDEVICES.

Ser. No. 60/726,731, filed on Oct. 14, 2005, and entitledSEMICONDUCTER-BASED SYNCIDATION AND OUTLINING.

Ser. No. 60/726,727, filed on Oct. 14, 2005, and entitled SYNDICATIONFILTERS.

Ser. No. 60/734,187, filed on Nov. 6, 2005, and entitled OPML SYSTEMS.

Ser. No. 60/734,156, filed on Nov. 6, 2005, and entitled NOTIFICATIONSERVICES FOR USE WITH OUTLINING AND SYNDICATION.

Ser. No. 60/735,712, filed on Nov. 11, 2005, and entitled OPMLPROCESSING MODULES AND SYSTEMS.

Ser. No. 60/741,770, filed on Dec. 1, 2005, and entitled NAVIGATION ANDMANIPULATION OF DISTRIBUTED CONTENT.

Ser. No. 60/741,958, filed on Dec. 2, 2005, and entitled DATABASES USINGOPML-BASED CONTENT POOLS AND SYNDICATED CONTENT.

Ser. No. 60/742,975, filed on Dec. 6, 2005, and entitled SYNDICATED DATAIN MEDICAL DECISION MAKING.

Ser. No. 60/749,757, filed on Dec. 13, 2005, and entitled AN ENTERPRISEPLATFORM FOR ENHANCED SYNDICATION.

Ser. No. 60/750,291, filed on Dec. 14, 2005, and entitled CREATING ANDMANAGING VIEWS OF SYNDICATED INFORMATION.

Ser. No. 60/751,254, filed on Dec. 15, 2005, and entitled SYNDICATEDTELECOMMUNICATION SERVICES.

Ser. No. 60/751,249, filed on Dec. 16, 2005, and entitled USE OFSYNDICATED DATA WITHIN INSTITUTIONAL HEALTHCARE PRACTICES.

Ser. No. 60/753,959, filed on Dec. 23, 2005, and entitled METHODS ANDSYSTEMS FOR CREATING AND MANAGING VIEWS OF SYNDICATED INFORMATION VIA ACOMMUNICATIONS NETWORK.

Ser. No. 60/756,774, filed on Jan. 6, 2006, and entitled COMPOSITESERVICE VISUALIZATION TOOLS.

Ser. No. 60/759,483, filed on Jan. 16, 2006, and entitled USE OFSYNDICATED DATA WITHIN HEALTHCARE PROVIDER AND GROUP PRACTICES.

BACKGROUND

1. Field of Invention

The invention relates to hardware, software and electronic servicecomponents and systems to provide large-scale, reliable, and securefoundations for distributed databases and content management systems,combining unstructured and structured data, and allowing post-inputreorganization to achieve a high degree of flexibility.

2. Description of Related Art

One can envision highly distributed databases capable of managingsimultaneous participation by billions of users, and highly distributedcontent management systems coordinating the contributions of billions,routinely integrating the contributions of both people and machines, andspanning multiple organizations, firms, and the globe itself. One canimagine flexible systems, where data is input in unstructured as well asstructured forms, and subsequent users can access and present the datain flexible, evolving forms not anticipated at the point of data entry.Massively parallel processing—envisioned as occurring inside one machineor cluster of machines—was once the premier challenge facing thedatabase and content management community. The new challenge, in ourview, is massively parallel, and flexible, participation of billions.

In order to accomplish this, the world will need a new “businessecosystem.” Advances in information technology often show three relatedthemes that may be thought of as analogous to the biological processesof expansion of and species succession in natural ecosystems. First,non-expert end-users will be empowered to solve problems. Second,technology platforms will be created that modularize technologycontributions into niches. The niche contributions interrelate with eachother through standard protocols and interfaces that are made “open” totechnologists and the general public, so that tens, hundreds, andsometimes millions of innovators can contribute to the resultingbusiness ecosystem, each according to his or her choice, creativity andcompetence. In turn new niches will be established, opened-up, and willbring in further new contributors and contributions.

As the business ecosystem expands, some specific technologicalcomponents will become critical enablers to the continuing advance ofthe whole. Issues of flexibility, scale, reliability, and security willbecome vital to the community. These vital components, for examplemicroprocessors, storage controllers, and network devices in thepersonal computer ecosystem, will require systematic application ofresearch and development, capital investment, and coordination withindustry partners in order that the whole ecosystem can progress. If theworld is to make real the vision of the flexible participation ofbillions, there are a number of core components and systems that havenot been invented, and will need to be invented.

The flexible participation of billions has been presaged byblogging—that is, the act of individuals creating Web sites and addingto them more or less daily. By dramatically increasing production andsharing of Web-based content, the blogging movement now produces avirtual river of content—available continuously and with globalcirculation. Just as word processing empowered millions to create theirown documents, blogging software has made it relatively easy formillions to produce their own Web sites and keep them continuallyupdated. By the promotion of a simple underlying standard for sharingtext and other media, blogging has popularized the “syndication” orpassing on of content borrowed from others—extending the reach of anygiven blogger and further increasing the total quantity of informationin circulation.

A number of companies have emerged as niche players targeting variousaspects of large-scale distributed databases, content management, andgroup participation. For example, some companies such as FeedDemon,NewsGator, myYahoo (Yahoo), and Bloglines have focused on client-sideaggregation and presentation. Companies such as Technorati, Google, andFeedster have focused on the complementary services of searching fordata feeds of interest. Other companies have focused on technologies forproviding syndicated data streams such as SixApart, Drupal, TypePad,Flickr, Picasa (Google), and Blogger (Google). Other companies havepositioned themselves as content providers, including new companies suchas Engadget, Weblogs Inc., Topix.net, and MySpace, as well asestablished media companies such as the New York Times and BBC. Ofcourse, various generic Internet technologies are also relevant to therapidly growing weblog data flow, such as BitTorrent or Akamai'sEdgePlatform.

While offering significant advancement in terms of experiences such assharing news, music, videos and other items, as well as enabling playersof games to interact with each other individually and in groups, thevalue chain is weak, fragmented, and closed to interoperability amongcontributors in many areas. The value chain will benefit from bothimproved contributions in specific functions or niches, as well as amore comprehensive overall vision of a possible “flexible participationsof billions” ecosystem, additional niches (layers and modules) offunctionality, recast functionality among modules, rationalization ofprotocols and interfaces among modules, and custom combinations offunctions that establish end-to-end solutions for specific purposes. Forexample, available services are weak in presentation, search, signal,and network routing. Aggregators that centralize content use displayformats that are widely criticized, despite a general agreement amongusers that they improve over conventional search engine displays.Storage of most blog content is in proprietary, isolated data setscontrolled by blog service operators, and the data cannot be easilyrestructured or even moved from one provider to another. In theircurrent form, services fail to provide enterprise-class features such assecurity, privacy, data integrity, and quality of service.

There remains a vital need for components and services that explicitlyaddress the challenge of enabling the “flexible participation ofbillions” and that are capable of levels of scale, reliability, securityand flexibility as yet unrealized and perhaps unimagined. There is aneed for a new global business ecosystem, within which innovation bymillions of people will be embraced, in order to meet the challenge. Inorder to stimulate the formation and rapid evolution of such a businessecosystem, there will have to be systematic development of generalpurpose software, systems and protocols specifically engineered toenable the flexible participation of billions. There also remains a needfor such an infrastructure in the health care industry.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Disclosed herein are systems and methods for syndication and managementof structured and unstructured data to assist institutional healthcaredelivery, healthcare providers' practices, healthcare providers' grouppractices, collaborative academic research and decision making inhealthcare, including through the utilization of medical devices andhealthcare pools.

In one aspect, a method and system disclosed herein includes thehandling of health care information based at least in part on providinga user interface that is adapted to receive and handle information thatis syndicated from a plurality of pools of information, the poolsincluding at least one pool of health care information.

In embodiments, the syndicated information may be secured by a securityfacility. The security facility may protect information according to apool-specific security protocol.

In embodiments, the syndicated information may be structured into ahierarchy. The hierarchy may be defined using OPML. The hierarchy may bedefined according to what pools are accessed by what portion of thehierarchy. The hierarchy may define conditions for aggregatinginformation from the pools. In embodiments, the pools may be stored withprotocols for using the information in the pools. The pools may bestored with conditions for access of the pools. The pools may includepatient record data that is de-identified.

In embodiments, a portion of the syndicated information may be publishedby a healthcare device.

In embodiments, the pools may contain information selected from a groupincluding, but not limited to, medical instruments, x-ray equipment, MRIequipment, other forms of medical imaging equipment, blood work data,genetic information, medical exam information, medical deviceinformation, information from emergency rooms, information from medicallabs, diet information, exercise information, metabolic information,medical history information, age information, gender information,behavior information, race information, or information from othersystems related to the healthcare and or medical field.

In one aspect, a method and system disclosed herein includes involvingthe handling of health care based at least in part on disposing healthcare information into a plurality of pools of information, andsyndicating the information from at least one of the plurality of pools.In embodiments, syndicating the information may involve a dynamicgeneration of syndicated content that may further involve processing arequest to convert information into syndicated information. The step ofprocessing the request may involve a security check.

In embodiments, the syndicated information may be secured by a securityfacility. The security facility may protect information according to apool-specific security protocol.

In embodiments, the syndicated information may be structured into ahierarchy. The hierarchy may be defined using OPML. The hierarchy may bedefined according to what pools are accessed by what portion of thehierarchy. The hierarchy may define conditions for aggregatinginformation from the pools. In embodiments, the pools may be stored withprotocols for using the information in the pools. The pools may bestored with conditions for access of the pools. The pools may includepatient record data that is de-identified.

In embodiments, a portion of the syndicated information may be publishedby a healthcare device.

In embodiments, the pools may contain information selected from a groupincluding, but not limited to, medical instruments, x-ray equipment, MRIequipment, other forms of medical imaging equipment, blood work data,genetic information, medical exam information, medical deviceinformation, information from emergency rooms, information from medicallabs, diet information, exercise information, metabolic information,medical history information, age information, gender information,behavior information, race information, or information from othersystems related to the healthcare and or medical field.

In one aspect, a method and system disclosed herein includes thehandling of healthcare information based at least in part on configuringa healthcare device to subscribe to a data fee of healthcareinformation. In embodiments, the data feed may be adapted to collecthealthcare information with is in RSS format, OPML format, or otherformats.

In embodiments, the device may be selected from a device groupincluding, but not limited to, anesthesiology devices, cardiovasculardevices, clinical chemistry devices, clinical toxicology devices, dentaldevices, ear nose and throat devices, gastroenterology devices, urologydevices, general surgery devices, plastic surgery devices, generalhospital devices, personal use devices, hematology devices, pathologydevices, immunology devices, mammography devices, neurological devices,obstetrical devices, gynecological devices, ophthalmic devices, physicalmedicine devices, radiology devices, clinical chemistry testing devices,clinical toxicology testing devices, immunology testing devices, andmicrobiology testing devices.

In embodiments, the healthcare device may be a medical device, medicalinstrument, handheld medical device, a device associated with anoperating room, a device configured to display an electronic medicalrecord, a device configured to run a healthcare software application,and the like.

In embodiments, the healthcare device may subscribe to the syndicateddata feed wirelessly.

In embodiments, the healthcare device may be associated with a hospitalenvironment, used to examine a health condition, and or used to measurean environmental condition of a healthcare environment.

In embodiments, the syndicated information may originate from aplurality of separate pools of information. The information may bestructured into a hierarchy. The hierarchy may defined by using OPML.

In embodiments, the information may be secured. The information may beassociated with a security facility. The security facility may securethe information according to a data pool-specific security protocol.

In one aspect, a method and system disclosed herein includes thehandling of healthcare information based at least in part on configuringa healthcare device to syndicate information that is periodicallyhandled by the device. In embodiments, the step of syndicating thehealthcare information may comprise receiving information and formattingthe information in a syndication format, such as RSS, OPML, or otherformats.

In embodiments, the device may be selected from a device groupincluding, but not limited to, anesthesiology devices, cardiovasculardevices, clinical chemistry devices, clinical toxicology devices, dentaldevices, ear nose and throat devices, gastroenterology devices, urologydevices, general surgery devices, plastic surgery devices, generalhospital devices, personal use devices, hematology devices, pathologydevices, immunology devices, mammography devices, neurological devices,obstetrical devices, gynecological devices, ophthalmic devices, physicalmedicine devices, radiology devices, clinical chemistry testing devices,clinical toxicology testing devices, immunology testing devices, andmicrobiology testing devices.

In embodiments, the healthcare device may be a medical device, medicalinstrument, handheld medical device, a device associated with anoperating room, a device configured to display an electronic medicalrecord, a device configured to run a healthcare software application,and the like.

In embodiments, the step of syndicating the information may comprisepublication of the information. The information may be published to adata pool, a secured data pool, and the like. The information may besecured. The information may be associated with a security facility. Thesecurity facility may secure the information according to a datapool-specific security protocol.

In embodiments, the healthcare device may publish the syndicatedinformation wirelessly.

In embodiments, the healthcare device may be associated with a hospitalenvironment, used to examine a health condition, and or used to measurean environmental condition of a healthcare environment.

In embodiments, the syndicated information may originate from aplurality of separate pools of information. The information may bestructured into a hierarchy. The hierarchy may defined by using OPML.

Each aspect of the foregoing may be embodied in one or more of aclient-side application, a server-side application, one or moresemiconductor devices, a computer program product embodied in a computerreadable medium, a web service, a services-oriented architectureservice, an applet, or an application, either alone or in combination.Further, each of the foregoing systems may also, or instead, be embodiedin a method, or in a computer program product embodied in a computerreadable medium that, when executing on one or more computers, performsthe steps of such a method.

The terms “feed”, “data feed”, “data stream” and the like, as well asthe S-definition described further herein, as used herein, are intendedto refer interchangeably to syndicated data feeds and/or descriptions ofsuch feeds. While RSS is one popular example of a syndicated data feed,any other source of news or other items may be used with the systemsdescribed herein, such as the outlining markup language, OPML, and theseterms should be given the broadest possible meaning unless a narrowsense is explicitly provided or clear from the context. Similarly, termssuch as “item”, “news item”, and “post”, as well as the S-messagesdescribed further herein, are intended to refer to items within a datafeed, and may contain text and/or binary data encoding any digital mediaincluding still or moving images, audio, application-specific fileformats, and so on.

The term “syndication” is intended to refer to publication,republication, or other distribution of content using any suitabletechnology, including RSS and any extensions or modifications thereto,as well as any other publish-subscribe or similar technology that may besuitably adapted to the methods and systems described herein.“Syndicated” is intended to describe content in syndication.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES

The foregoing and other objects and advantages of the invention will beappreciated more fully from the following further description thereof,with reference to the accompanying drawings, wherein:

FIG. 1 shows a network that may be used with the systems describedherein.

FIG. 2 shows a system for using and aggregating data feeds.

FIG. 3 depicts markets for syndicated content.

FIG. 4 depicts a conceptual framework for syndicated communications.

FIG. 5 depicts a system for delivering services in a syndication system.

FIG. 6 shows an XML environment for syndication systems.

FIG. 7 shows a user interface for a syndication system.

FIG. 8 shows a user interface for a syndication system.

FIG. 9 shows a user interface for a syndication system.

FIG. 10 shows a data pool environment.

FIGS. 11A and 11B show embodiments of filters for syndicated content.

FIG. 12 shows a method for filtering syndicated content.

FIG. 13 shows a syndication environment including an application and/orinterface.

FIG. 14 shows a syndication environment including database functions.

FIG. 15 shows a syndication environment including a semantic facility.

FIG. 16 shows a syndication environment including a syndicationfacility.

FIG. 17 shows a syndication environment including an infrastructure.

FIG. 18 shows a syndication environment including special properties.

FIG. 19 shows a syndicated management system including an applicationand/or interface.

FIG. 20 shows a syndicated management system including databasefunctions.

FIG. 21 shows a syndicated management system including a semanticfacility.

FIG. 22 shows a syndicated management system including a syndicationfacility.

FIG. 23 shows a syndicated management system including aninfrastructure.

FIG. 24 shows a syndicated management system including specialproperties.

FIG. 25 shows a syndication environment including a medical device andan application and/or interface.

FIG. 26 shows a syndication environment including a medical device anddatabase functions.

FIG. 27 shows a syndication environment including a medical device and asemantic facility.

FIG. 28 shows a syndication environment including a medical device and asyndication facility.

FIG. 29 shows a syndication environment including a medical device andan infrastructure.

FIG. 30 shows a syndication environment including a medical device andspecial properties.

FIG. 31 shows a health care information management system.

FIG. 32 shows a health care information management system.

FIG. 33 shows a health care information management system.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Various embodiments of the present invention are described below,including certain embodiments relating particularly to RSS feeds andother syndicated data streams. It should be appreciated, however, thatthe present invention is not limited to any particular protocol for datafeeds and that the various embodiments discussed explicitly herein areprimarily for purposes of illustration. Thus, the term syndicationgenerally, and references to RSS specifically, should be understood toinclude, for example, RDF, RSS v 0.90, 0.91, 0.9x, 1.0, and 2.0,variously attributable to Netscape, UserLand Software, and otherindividuals and organizations, as well as Atom from the AtomEnabledAlliance, and any other similar formats, as well as non-conventionalsyndication formats that can be adapted for syndication, such as OPML.Still more generally, while RSS technology is described, and RSSterminology is used extensively throughout, it will be appreciated thatthe various concepts discussed herein may be usefully employed in avariety of other contexts. For example, various privacy and identitytechniques described herein could be usefully combined with HTML Webcontent rather than RSS-based XML data. Similarly, some of the brandingand advertising techniques described herein may be usefully combinedwith list servers, bulletin boards, or other Internet news sources.Thus, it will be understood that the embodiments described herein areprovided by way of example only and are not intended to limit the scopeof the inventive concepts disclosed herein.

FIG. 1 shows a network for providing a syndicated data stream such as anRSS stream. Short for Really Simple Syndication, RDF (ResourceDescription Framework) Site Summary or Rich Site Summary, RSS is an XMLformat for syndicating Web content. A Web site operator who wants toallow other sites to publish some of the Web site's content may createan RSS document and register the document with an RSS publisher. Thepublished or “syndicated” content can then be presented on a differentsite, or through an aggregator or other system, directly at a clientdevice. Syndicated content may include such data as news feeds, eventslistings, news stories, headlines, project updates, and excerpts fromdiscussion forums or even corporate information. While RSS content oftenincludes text, other data may also be syndicated, typically in binaryform, such as images, audio, and so forth. The systems described hereinmay use all such forms of data feed. In one embodiment, the XML/RSS feeditself may be converted to binary in order to conserve communicationsbandwidth. This may employ, for example, Microsoft's DINE specificationfor binary information or any other suitable binary format.

As shown in FIG. 1, a network 100 may include a plurality of clients 102and servers 104 connected via an internetwork 110. Any number of clients102 and servers 104 may participate in such a system 100. The system mayfurther include one or more local area networks (“LAN”) 112interconnecting clients 102 through a hub 114 (in, for example, a peernetwork such as a wired or wireless Ethernet network) or a local areanetwork server 114 (in, for example, a client-server network). The LAN112 may be connected to the internetwork 110 through a gateway 116,which provides security to the LAN 112 and ensures operatingcompatibility between the LAN 112 and the internetwork 110. Any datanetwork may be used as the internetwork 110 and the LAN 112.

In one aspect of the systems described herein, a device within theinternetwork 110 such as a router or, on an enterprise level, a gatewayor other network edge or switching device, may cache popular data feedsto reduce redundant traffic through the internetwork 110. In othernetwork enhancements, clients 102 may be enlisted to coordinate sharingof data feeds using techniques such as those employed in a BitTorrentpeer-to-peer network. In the systems described herein, these and othertechniques generally may be employed to improve performance of an RSS orother data feed network.

In one embodiment, the internetwork 110 is the Internet, and the WorldWide Web provides a system for interconnecting clients 102 and servers104 in a communicating relationship through the Internet 110. Theinternetwork 110 may also, or instead, include a cable network, and atleast one of the clients 102 may be a set-top box, cable-ready gameconsole, or the like. The internetwork 110 may include other networks,such as satellite networks, the Public Switched Telephone Network, WiFinetworks, WiMax networks, cellular networks, and any other public,private, or dedicated networks that might be used to interconnectdevices for transfer of data.

An exemplary client 102 may include a processor, a memory (e.g. RAM), abus which couples the processor and the memory, a mass storage device(e.g. a magnetic hard disk or an optical storage disk) coupled to theprocessor and the memory through an I/O controller, and a networkinterface coupled to the processor and the memory, such as a modem,digital subscriber line (“DSL”) card, cable modem, network interfacecard, wireless network card, or other interface device capable of wired,fiber optic, or wireless data communications. One example of such aclient 102 is a personal computer equipped with an operating system suchas Microsoft Windows XP, UNIX, or Linux, along with software support forInternet communication protocols. The personal computer may also includea browser program, such as Microsoft Internet Explorer, NetscapeNavigator, or FireFox, to provide a user interface for access to theinternetwork 110. Although the personal computer is a typical client102, the client 102 may also be a workstation, mobile computer, Webphone, VOIP device, television set-top box, interactive kiosk, personaldigital assistant, wireless electronic mail device, or other devicecapable of communicating over the Internet. As used herein, the term“client” is intended to refer to any of the above-described clients 102or other client devices, and the term “browser” is intended to refer toany of the above browser programs or other software or firmwareproviding a user interface for navigating an internetwork 110 such asthe Internet.

An exemplary server 104 includes a processor, a memory (e.g. RAM), a buswhich couples the processor and the memory, a mass storage device (e.g.a magnetic or optical disk) coupled to the processor and the memorythrough an I/O controller, and a network interface coupled to theprocessor and the memory. Servers may be clustered together to handlemore client traffic and may include separate servers for differentfunctions such as a database server, an application server, and a Webpresentation server. Such servers may further include one or more massstorage devices such as a disk farm or a redundant array of independentdisk (“RAID”) system for additional storage and data integrity.Read-only devices, such as compact disk drives and digital versatiledisk drives, may also be connected to the servers. Suitable servers andmass storage devices are manufactured by, for example, Compaq, IBM, andSun Microsystems. Generally, a server 104 may operate as a source ofcontent and provide any associated back-end processing, while a client102 is a consumer of content provided by the server 104. However, itshould be appreciated that many of the devices described above may beconfigured to respond to remote requests, thus operating as a server,and the devices described as servers 104 may operate as clients ofremote data sources. In contemporary peer-to-peer networks andenvironments such as RSS environments, the distinction between clientsand servers blurs. Accordingly, as used herein, the term “server” asused herein is generally intended to refer to any of the above-describedservers 104, or any other device that may be used to provide contentsuch as RSS feeds in a networked environment.

In one aspect, a client 102 or server 104 as described herein mayprovide OPML-specific functionality or, more generally, functionality tosupport a system using outlining grammar or markup language withprocessing, storage, search, routing, and the like.

For example, the network 100 may include an OPML or RSS router. Whilethe following discussion details routing of OPML content, it will beunderstood that the system described may also, or instead, be employedfor RSS or any other outlined or syndicated content. The network 100 mayinclude a plurality of clients 102 that are OPML users and a number ofservers 104 that are OPML sources connected via an internetwork 110. Anynumber of clients 102 and servers 104 may participate in such a network100. A device within the internetwork 110 such as a router or, on anenterprise level, a gateway or other network edge or switching device,may cache popular data feeds to reduce redundant traffic through theinternetwork 110. In other network enhancements, clients 102 may beenlisted to coordinate sharing of data feeds using techniques such asthose employed in a BitTorrent peer-to-peer network. In the systemsdescribed herein, these and other techniques generally may be employedto improve performance of an OPML data network.

A router generally may be understood as a computer networking devicethat forwards data packets across an internetwork through a processknown as routing. A router may act as a junction between two networks,transferring data packets between them and validating that informationis sent to the correct location. Routing most typically is associatedwith Internet Protocol (IP); however, specialized routers exist forrouting particular types of data, such as ADSL routers forasynchronously routing signals across digital subscriber lines. An OPMLrouter may route data across an internetwork, such as the Internet,which may include data in OPML format. In particular, the OPML routermay be configured to route data in response to or in correspondence withthe structure or the content of an OPML document; that is, variousspecies of OPML router may be provided that correspond to user-developedoutline structures in OPML. For example, a financial services OPMLoutline may correspond to a financial services OPML router that isconfigured to route financial services data packets among constituentnetworks of one or more financial services institutions.

An OPML router may use a configuration table, also known as a routingtable, to determine the appropriate route for sending a packet,including an OPML data packet. The configuration table may includeinformation on which connections lead to particular groups of addresses,connection priorities, and rules for handling routine and special typesof network traffic. In embodiments, the configuration table isdynamically configurable in correspondence to the incoming structure ofan OPML data packet; that is, an OPML structure may be provided thatincludes routing instructions that are automatically executed by theOPML router. In other embodiments, a configuration table is configuredto route particular portions of an OPML-structured document toparticular addresses. In embodiments an OPML router includes rules thatcan be triggered by OPML content, such as rules for prioritizing nodes,rules for routing OPML content to particular locations, and the like.The rules may be triggered by the structure of an OPML document, thetitle, or one or more content items within the OPML document.

In the process of transferring data between networks, an OPML router mayperform translations of various protocols between the two networks,including, for example, translating data from one data format toanother, such as taking RSS input data and outputting data in anotherformat. In embodiments the OPML router may also protect networks fromone another by preventing the traffic on one from unnecessarily spillingover to the other, or it may perform a security function by using rulesthat limit the access that computers from outside the network may haveto computers inside the network. The security rules may be triggered bythe content of the OPML document, the structure of an OPML document, orother features, such as the author, title, or the like. For example, anOPML router may include an authentication facility that requires an OPMLdocument to contain a password, a particular structure, an embeddedcode, or the like in order to be routed to a particular place. Such asecurity feature can protect networks from each other and can be used toenable features such as version control.

OPML routers may be deployed in various network contexts and locations.An OPML edge router may connect OPML clients to the Internet. An OPMLcore router may serve solely to transmit OPML and other data among otherrouters. Data traveling over the Internet, whether in the form of a Webpage, a downloaded file or an e-mail message, travels over apacket-switching network. In this system, the data in a message or fileis broken up into packages approximately 1,500 bytes long. Each of thesepackages has a “wrapper” that includes information on the sender'saddress, the receiver's address, the package's place in the entiremessage, and how the receiving computer can be sure that the packagearrived intact. Each data package, called a packet, is then sent off toits destination via the best available route. In embodiments, the OPMLrouter determines the best available route taking into account thestructure of the OPML document, including the need to maintainassociations among packets. A selected route may be taken by all packetsin the message or only a single packet in a message. By packaging datain this manner, a network can continuously balance the data load on itsequipment. For example, if one component of a network is overloaded ormalfunctioning, data packets may be routed for processing on othernetwork equipment that has a lighter data load and/or is properlyworking. An OPML router may also route OPML content according tosemantic structure. For example, an OPML router configured to handlemedical records may route X-Rays to an expert in reading X-Rays whilerouting insurance information to another department of a hospital.

Routers may reconfigure the paths that data packets take because theylook at the information surrounding the data packet and can communicatewith each other about line conditions within the network, such as delaysin receiving and sending data and the overall traffic load on a network.An OPML router may communicate with other OPML routers to determine, forexample, whether the entire structure of an OPML document was preservedor whether recipients of a particular component in fact received therouted component. Again, the OPML document itself may include astructure for routing it. A router may also locate preferential sourcesfor OPML content using caching and other techniques. Thus, for example,where an OPML document includes content from an external reference, theexternal reference may be a better source for that portion of the OPMLdocument based upon an analysis of, e.g., network congestion, geographicproximity, and the like.

An OPML router may use a subnet mask to determine the proper routing fora data packet. The subnet mask may employ a model similar to IPaddressing. This tells the OPML router that all messages in which thesender and receiver have an address sharing the first three groups ofnumbers are on the same network and shouldn't be sent out to anothernetwork. For example, if a computer at address 15.57.31.40 sends arequest to the computer at 15.57.31.52, the router will match the firstthree groups in the IP addresses (15.57.31) and keep the packet on thelocal network. OPML routers may be programmed to understand the mostcommon network protocols. This programming may include informationregarding the format of addresses, the format of OPML documents, thenumber of bytes in the basic package of data sent out over the network,and the method which insures all the packages reach their destinationand get reassembled, including into the structure of an OPML document,if desired.

There are two major routing algorithms in common use: global routingalgorithms and decentralized routing algorithms. In decentralizedrouting algorithms, each router has information about the routers towhich it is directly connected but does not know about every router inthe network. These algorithms are also known as DV (distance vector)algorithms. In global routing algorithms, every router has completeinformation about all other routers in the network and the trafficstatus of the network. These algorithms are also known as LS (linkstate) algorithms. In LS algorithms, every router identifies the routersthat are physically connected to them and obtains their IP addresses.When a router starts working, it first sends a “HELLO” packet over thenetwork. Each router that receives this packet replies with a messagethat contains its IP address. All routers in the network measure thedelay time (or any other important parameters of the network, such asaverage traffic) for its neighboring routers within the network. Inorder to do this, the routers send echo packets over the network. Everyrouter that receives these packets replies with an echo reply packet. Bydividing round trip time by two, routers can compute the delay time.This delay time includes both transmission and processing times (i.e.,the time it takes the packets to reach the destination and the time ittakes the receiver to process them and reply). Because of thisinter-router communication, each OPML router within the network knowsthe structure and status of the network and can use this information toselect the best route between two nodes of a network.

The selection of the best available route between two nodes on a networkmay be done using an algorithm, such as the Dijkstra shortest pathalgorithm. In this algorithm, an OPML router, based on information thathas been collected from other OPML routers, builds a graph of thenetwork. This graph shows the location of OPML routers in the networkand their links to each other. Every link is labeled with a numbercalled the weight or cost. This number is a function of delay time,average traffic, and sometimes simply the number of disparate linksbetween nodes. For example, if there are two links between a node and adestination, the OPML router chooses the link with the lowest weight.

Closely related to the function of OPML routers, OPML switches mayprovide another network component that improves data transmission speedin a network. OPML switches may allow different nodes (a networkconnection point, typically a computer) of a network to communicatedirectly with one another in a smooth and efficient manner. Switchesthat provide a separate connection for each node in a company's internalnetwork are called LAN switches. Essentially, a LAN switch creates aseries of instant networks that contain only the two devicescommunicating with each other at that particular moment. An OPML switchmay be configured to route data based on the OPML structure of thatdata.

In one embodiment, an OPML router may be a one-armed router used toroute packets in a virtual LAN environment. In the case of a one-armedrouter, the multiple attachments to different networks are all over thesame physical link. OPML routers may also function as an Internetgateway (e.g., for small networks in homes and offices), such as wherean Internet connection is an always-on broadband connection like cablemodem or DSL.

The network 100 may also, or instead, include an OPML server, asdescribed in greater detail below. OPML, which may, for example, beencapsulated within an RSS data feed, may contain one or more RSSchannel identifiers or items, or may be a separate document, has thegeneral format shown in the OPML specification hosted atwww.opml.org/spec, the entire contents of which is incorporated hereinby reference. The structure generally includes OPML delimiters, generalauthorship and creation data, formatting/viewing data (if any), and aseries of outline entries according to a knowledge structure devised bythe author.

An OPML server may be provided for manipulating OPML content. The OPMLserver may provide services and content to clients 102 using, forexample, a Web interface, an API, an XML processing interface, an RSSfeed, an OPML renderer, and the like.

The OPML server may, for example, provide a search engine service tovisitors. Output from the OPML server may be an OPML file, an HTML file,or any other file suitable for rendering to a client device orsubsequent processing. The file may, for example, have a name thatexplicitly contains the search query from which it was created in orderto facilitate redistribution, modification, recreation, synchronization,updating, and storage of the OPML file. A user may also manipulate thefile, such as by adding or removing outline elements representingindividual search results, or by reprioritizing or otherwisereorganizing the results, and the user may optionally store the revisedsearch as a new OPML file. Thus in one aspect the OPML server may createnew, original OPML content based upon user queries submitted thereto. Ina sense, this function is analogous to the function of aggregators in anRSS syndication system, where new content may be dynamically createdfrom a variety of different sources and republished in a structuredform.

The OPML server may, more generally, provide a front-end for an OPMLdatabase that stores OPML content. The OPML database may store OMPL datain a number of forms, such as by casting the OPML structure into acorresponding relational database where each OPML file is encapsulatedas one or more records. The OPML database may also store links toexternal OPML content or may traverse OPML content through any number oflayers and store data, files, and the like externally referenced in OPMLdocuments. Thus, for example, where an OPML file references an externalOPML file, that external OPML file may be retrieved by the database andparsed and stored. The external OPML file may, in turn, reference otherexternal OPML files that may be similarly processed to construct, withinthe database, an entire OPML tree. The OMPL database may also, orinstead, store OPML files as simple text or in any number of formatsoptimized for searching (such as a number of well-known techniques usedby large scale search engines Google, AltaVista, and the like), or forOPML processing, or for any other purpose(s). The OPML database mayprovide coherency for formation of an OPML network among an array ofclients 102 and servers 104, where content within the network 100 isstructured according to user-created OPML outlines.

The OPML server may provide a number of functions or services related toOPML content. For example, the OPML server may permit a user to publishOPML content, either at a hosted site or locally from a user's computer.The OPML server may provide a ping service for monitoring updates ofOPML content. The OPML server may provide a validation service tovalidate content according to the OPML specification. The OPML servermay provide a search service or function which may permit searchingagainst a database of OPML content, or it may provide user-configurablespidering capabilities to search for OPML content across a wide areanetwork. The OPML server may provide an interface for browsing (or moregenerally, navigating) and/or reading OPML content. The OPML server mayprovide tools for creating, editing, and/or managing OPML content.

The OPML server may provide a number of complementary functions orservices to support OPML-based transactions, content management, and thelike. In one aspect, a renderer or converter may be provided to convertbetween a structured format such as OPML and a presentation format suchas PowerPoint and display the respective forms. While the converter maybe used with OPML and PowerPoint, it should be understood that theconverter may be usefully employed with a variety of other structured,hierarchical, or outlined formats and a variety of presentation formatsor programs. For example, the presentation format may include PortableDocument Format, Flash Animation, electronic books, a variety of OpenSource alternatives to PowerPoint (e.g., OpenOffice.org's Presenter,KDE's KPresenter, HTML Slidy, and so forth), whether or not they arePowerPoint compatible. The structured format may include OPML, an MSWord outline, simple text, or any other structured content, as well asfiles associated with leaf nodes thereof, such as audio, visual, movingpicture, text, spreadsheet, chart, table, graphic, or any other format,any of which may be rendered in association with the structured formatand/or converted between a structured format and a presentation formatIt will also be understood that the converter may be deployed on aclient device for local manipulation, processing, and/or republicationof content.

The OPML database may, for example, operate through the OPML server togenerate, monitor, and/or control spiders that locate OPML content. Aspider may, upon identification of a valid OPML file, retrieve the fileand process it into the database. A spider may also process an OPML fileto identify external references, systematically traversing an entireOPML tree. A spider may be coordinated using known techniques toidentify redundant references within a hierarchy. A spider may alsodifferentiate processing according to, e.g., structure, content,location, file types, metadata, and the like. The user interfacedescribed below may also include one or more tools for configuringspiders, including a front end for generating initial queries,displaying results, and tagging results with any suitable metadata.

By way of example, and not of limitation, medical records may be storedas OPML files, either within the database or in a distributed fashionamong numerous locations across the OPML network. Thus, for example,assorted X-Ray data may be maintained in one location, MRI data inanother location, patient biographical data in another location, andclinical notes in another location. These data may be entirely decoupledfrom individual patients (thus offering a degree of security/privacy)and optionally may include references to other content, such asdirectories of other types of data, directories of readers orinterpretive metadata for understanding or viewing records, and thelike. Separately, OPML files may be created to provide structure to thedistributed data. For example, a CT Scan OPML master record may indexthe locations of all CT Scan records, which may be useful, for example,for studies or research relating to aggregated CT Scan data. This typeof horizontal structure may be captured in one or more OPML recordswhich may themselves be hierarchical. Thus, for example, one OPML filemay identify participating hospitals by external reference to OPMLrecords for those hospitals. Each hospital may provide a top-level OPMLfile that identifies OPML records that are available, which may in turnidentify all CT Scan records maintained at that hospital. The CT Scanmaster record may traverse the individual hospital OPML records toprovide a flattened list of CT Scan records available in the system. Asanother example, an OPML file may identify medical data for a particularpatient. This OPML file may traverse records of any number of differenthospitals or other medical institutions, or it may directly identifyparticular records where, for example, concerns about confidentialitycause institutions to strip any personally identifying data fromrecords. For certain applications, it may be desirable to have a centralregistry of data so that records such as patient data are notinadvertently lost due to, for example, data migration within aparticular hospital.

Thus in one embodiment there is generally disclosed herein a pull-baseddata management system in which atomic units of data are passivelymaintained at any number of network-accessible locations, whilestructure is imposed on the data through atomic units of relationshipthat may be arbitrarily defined through OPML or other grammars. Thesource data may be selectively pulled and organized according touser-defined OPML definitions. The OPML server and OPML database mayenable such a system by providing a repository for organization andsearch of source data in the OPML network. Traversing OPML trees tofully scope an outline composed of a number of nested OPML outlines maybe performed by a client 102 or may be performed by the OPML server,either upon request from a client 102 for a particular outline orcontinually in a manner that insures integrity of external referencelinks.

In another aspect, there is disclosed herein a link maintenance systemfor use in an OPML network. In general, a link maintenance system mayfunction to insure integrity of external references contained withinOPML files. Broken links, which may result for example from deletion ormigration of source content, may be identified and addressed in a numberof ways. For example, a search can be performed using the OPML serverand OPML database for all OPML files including a reference to themissing target. Additionally, the OPML server and/or OPML database mayinclude a registry of content sources including an e-mail contactmanager/administrator of outside sources. Notification of the brokenlink including a reference to the content may be sent to all owners ofcontent. Optionally, the OPML server may automatically modify content todelete or replace the reference, assuming the OPML server hasauthorization to access such content. The OPML server may contact theowner of the missing content. The message to the owner may include arequest to provide an alternative link which may be forwarded to ownersof all content that references the missing content. If the referencedsubject matter has been fully indexed by the OPML server and/or OPMLdatabase, the content may itself be reconstructed and a replacement linkto the location of the reconstructed content provided. Variouscombinations of reconstruction and notification, such as those above,may be applied to maintain the integrity of links in OPML source filesindexed in the database. In various embodiments the links may becontinuously verified and updated, or the links may be updated only whenan OPML document with a broken link is requested by a client 102 andprocessed or traversed by the client 102 or the OPML server in response.

The OPML server may provide a client-accessible user interface to viewitems in a data stream or OMPL outline. The user interface may bepresented, for example, through a Web page viewed using a Web browser orthrough an outliner or outline viewer specifically adapted to displayOPML content. In general, an RSS or OPML file may be converted to HTMLfor display at a Web browser of a client 102. For example, the sourcefile on a server 104 may be converted to HTML using a Server-SideInclude (“SSI”) to bring the content into a template by iteratingthrough the XML/RSS internal structure. The resulting HTML may be viewedat a client 102 or posted to a different server 104 along with otheritems. The output may also, or instead, be provided in OPML form forviewing through an OPML renderer. Thus, feeds and items may be generallymixed, shared, forwarded, and the like in a variety of formats.

Again it is noted that specific references to OPML and RSS above are notintended to be limiting and more generally should be understood asreferences to any outlining, syndication, or other grammar suitable foruse with the systems described herein.

Focusing now on the internetwork 110, one embodiment is the Internet.The structure of the Internet 110 is well known to those of ordinaryskill in the art and includes a network backbone with networks branchingfrom the backbone. These branches, in turn, have networks branching fromthem and so on. The backbone and branches are connected by routers,bridges, switches, and other switching elements that operate to directdata through the internetwork 110. For a more detailed description ofthe structure and operation of the Internet 110, one may refer to “TheInternet Complete Reference,” by Harley Hahn and Rick Stout, publishedby McGraw-Hill, 1994. However, one may practice the present invention ona wide variety of communication networks. For example, the internetwork110 can include interactive television networks, telephone networks,wireless voice or data transmission systems, two-way cable systems,customized computer networks, Asynchronous Transfer Mode networks, andso on. Clients 102 may access the internetwork 110 through an InternetService Provider (“ISP”, not shown) or through a dedicated DSL service,ISDN leased lines, T1 lines, OC3 lines, digital satellite service, cablemodem service, or any other connection, or through an ISP providingsame.

In its present deployment as the Internet, the internetwork 110 includesa worldwide computer network that communicates using the well-definedTransmission Control Protocol (“TCP”) and Internet Protocol (“IP”) toprovide transport and network services. Computer systems that aredirectly connected to the Internet 110 each have a unique IP address.The IP address consists of four one-byte numbers (although a plannedexpansion to sixteen bytes is underway with IPv6). To simplify Internetaddressing, the Domain Name System (“DNS”) was created. The DNS allowsusers to access Internet resources with a simpler alphanumeric namingsystem. A DNS name consists of a series of alphanumeric names separatedby periods. When a domain name is used, the computer accesses a DNSserver to obtain the explicit four-byte IP address. It will beappreciated that other internetworks 110 may be used with the invention.For example, the internetwork 110 may be a wide-area network, a localarea network, a campus area network, or corporate area network. Theinternetwork 110 may be any other network used to communicate data, suchas a cable broadcast network.

To further define the resources on the Internet 110, the UniformResource Locator system was created. A Uniform Resource Locator (“URL”)is a descriptor that specifically defines a protocol for an Internetresource along with its location. URLs have the following format:

-   protocol://domain.address/path-name

in which the domain address and path-name provide a location for aresource, and the protocol defines the type of protocol used to accessthe resource. It will be appreciated that, in the context of thisparagraph only, the term “resource” is used in the conventional sense ofRFC 1738 to refer to a document, image, or the like available on theWeb. Web documents are identified by the protocol “http” which indicatesthat the hypertext transfer protocol should be used to access thedocument. Other common protocols include “ftp” (file transmissionprotocol), “mailto” (send electronic mail), “file” (local file), and“telnet.” The domain.address defines the domain name address of thecomputer on which the resource is located. Finally, the path-namedefines a directory path within the file system of the server thatidentifies the resource. As used herein, the term “IP address” isintended to refer to the four-byte Internet Protocol address (or theexpanded address provided by IPv6), and the term “Web address” isintended to refer to a domain name address, along with any resourceidentifier and path name appropriate to identify a particular Webresource. The term “address,” when used alone, may refer to either a Webaddress or an IP address.

In an exemplary embodiment, a browser, executing on one of the clients102, retrieves a Web document at an address from one of the servers 104via the internetwork 110 and displays the Web document on a viewingdevice, e.g., a screen. A user can retrieve and view the Web document byentering, or selecting a link to, a URL in the browser. The browser thensends an http request to the server 104 that has the Web documentassociated with the URL. The server 104 responds to the http request bysending the requested Web document to the client 102. The Web documentis an HTTP object that includes plain text (ASCII) conforming to theHyperText Markup Language (“HTML”). Other markup languages are known andmay be used on appropriately enabled browsers and servers, including theDynamic HyperText Markup Language (“DHTML”), the Extensible MarkupLanguage (“XML”), the Extensible Hypertext Markup Language (“XHML”), andthe Standard Generalized Markup Language (“SGML”).

Each Web document usually contains hyperlinks to other Web documents.The browser displays the Web document on the screen for the user, andthe hyperlinks to other Web documents are emphasized in some fashionsuch that the user can identify and select each hyperlink. To enhancefunctionality, a server 104 may execute programs associated with Webdocuments using programming or scripting languages, such as Perl, C,C++, C#, or Java, or a Common Gateway Interface (“CGI”) script to accessapplications on the server. A server 104 may also use server-sidescripting languages such as ColdFusion from MacroMedia or PHP. Theseprograms and languages may perform “back-end” functions such as orderprocessing, database management, and content searching. A Web documentmay also contain, or include references to, small client-sideapplications, or applets, that are transferred from the server 104 tothe client 102 along with a Web document and are executed locally by theclient 102. Java is one popular example of a programming language usedfor applets. The text within a Web document may further include(non-displayed) scripts that are executable by an appropriately enabledbrowser, using a scripting language such as JavaScript or Visual BasicScript. Browsers may further be enhanced with a variety of helperapplications to interpret various media including still image formatssuch as JPEG and GIF, document formats such as PS and PDF, motionpicture formats such as AVI and MPEG, animated media such as Flashmedia, and sound formats such as MP3 and MIDI. These media formats,along with a growing variety of proprietary media formats, may be usedto enrich a user's interactive and audio-visual experience as each Webdocument is presented through the browser. The term “page” as usedherein is intended to refer to the Web document described above as wellas any of the above-described functional or multimedia contentassociated with the Web document.

In general operation, a server 104 may provide a data stream to a client102. In an exemplary embodiment, the data stream may be a syndicateddata stream such as RSS, an XML grammar for sharing data through theWeb. An RSS-enabled server may include an RSS file with a title anddescription of items to be syndicated. As with simple HTML documents,the RSS file may be hand-coded or computer-generated. The first line ofan RSS file may contain an XML declaration of the form:

<?xml version=“1.0”?>

While not strictly required, this declaration may improve versioncompatibility. The next item in an RSS file may be a Document TypeDeclaration (“DTD”) that identifies the file as an RSS document:

<!DOCTYPE rss PUBLIC “-//Netscape Communications//DTD RSS 0.91//EN”“http://my.netscape.com/publish/formats/rss-0.91.dtd”>

The RSS element is the root or top-level element of an RSS file. The RSSelement must specify the version attribute (in this example, version0.91). It may also contain an encoding attribute (the default is UTF-8):

<rss version=“0.91” encoding=“ISO_(—)8859-1”>

The root element is the top-level element that contains the rest of anXML document. An RSS element may contain a channel with a title (thename of the channel), description (short description of the channel),link (HTML link to the channel Web site), language (language encoding ofthe channel, such as en-us for U.S. English), and one or more itemelements. A channel may also contain the following optional elements:

-   rating—an independent content rating, such as a PICS rating-   copyright—copyright notice information-   pubDate—date the channel was published-   lastBuildDate—date the RSS was last updated-   docs—additional information about the channel-   managingeditor—channel's managing editor-   webMaster—channel Webmaster-   image—channel image-   textinput—allows a user to send an HTML form text input string to a    URL-   skipHours—the hours that an aggregator should not collect the RSS    file-   skipDays—the weekdays that an aggregator should not collect the RSS    file

A channel may contain an image or logo. In RSS, the image elementcontains the image title and the URL of the image itself. The imageelement may also include the following optional elements: a link (a URLthat the image links to), a width, a height, and a description(additional text displayed with the image). There may also be a textinput element for an HTML text field. The text input element may includea title (label for a submit button), description, name, and link (tosend input). The link may enable richer functionality, such as allowinga user to submit search terms, send electronic mail, or perform anyother text-based function.

Once defined in this manner, a channel may contain a number of items,although some services (e.g., Netscape Netcenter) may limit the number.In general, the “item” elements provide headlines and summaries of thecontent to be shared. New items may be added, either manually orautomatically (such as through a script), by appending them to the RSSfile.

FIG. 2 depicts a system for using and aggregating data feeds or othersyndicated content. In general, data feeds 202, such as RSS sourcefiles, are generated from a content source 204 and made available foruse or review by clients 102 through a network.

The content source 204 may provide any electronic content includingnewspaper articles; Web magazine articles; academic papers; governmentdocuments such as court opinions, administrative rulings, regulationupdates, or the like; opinions; editorials; product reviews; moviereviews; financial or market analysis; current events; bulletins; andthe like. The content may include text, formatting, layout, graphics,audio files, image files, movie files, word processing files,spreadsheet files, presentation files, electronic documents, HTML files,executable files, scripts, multi-media, relational databases, data fromrelational databases and/or any other content type or combination oftypes suitable for syndication through a network. The content source 204may be any commercial media provider(s) such as newspapers, newsservices (e.g., Reuters or Bloomberg), or individual journalists such assyndicated columnists. The content source 204 may also be fromcommercial entities such as corporations, non-profit corporations,charities, religious organizations, social organizations, or the like,as well as from individuals with no affiliation to any of the foregoing.The content source 204 may be edited, as with news items, or automated,as with data feeds 202 such as stock tickers, sports scores, weatherconditions, and so on. While written text is commonly used in data feeds202, it will be appreciated that any digital media may be binary encodedand included in an item of a data feed 202 such as RSS. For example,data feeds 202 may include audio, moving pictures, still pictures,executable files, application-specific files (e.g., word processingdocuments or spreadsheets), and the like. It should also be understoodthat, while a content source 204 may generally be understood as a welldefined source of items for a data feed, the content source 204 may bemore widely distributed or subjectively gathered by a user preparing adata feed 202. For example, an individual user interested in automotivemechanics may regularly read a number of related magazines and regularlyattend trade shows. This information may be processed on an ad hoc basisby the individual and placed into a data feed 202 for review and use byothers. Thus it will be understood that the data stream systemsdescribed herein may have broad commercial use, as well asnon-commercial, educational, and mixed uses.

As described generally above, the data feed 202 may include, for eachitem of content, summary information such as a title, synopsis orabstract (or a teaser, for more marketing oriented materials), and alink to the underlying content. Thus as depicted in FIG. 2, when aclient 102 accesses a data feed 202, as depicted by an arrow 206, theclient 102 may then display the summary information for each item in auser interface. A client 102 may, in response to user input such asclicking on a title of an item in the user interface, retrieve theunderlying item from the content source 204 as indicated by an arrow208. In the bi-directional communication depicted by the arrow 208, theclient 102 may also identify the specific data feed 202 through whichthe item was identified, which may be useful for tracking distributionchannels, customer behavior, affiliate referral fees, and so forth. Itshould be appreciated that an RSS data feed 202 may be presented to aclient 102 as an RSS file (in XML format) that the client 102 locallyconverts to HTML for viewing through a Web browser, or the data feed 202may be converted to HTML at a Web site that responds to HTTP requestsfrom a client 102 and responds with an HTML-formatted data feed.

A related concept is the so-called “permalink” that provides a permanentURL reference to a source document that may be provided from, forexample, a dynamically generated Web site or a document repositoryserved from a relational database behind a Web server. While there is noofficial standard for permalink syntax or usage, they are widely used inconjunction with data feeds. Permalinks typically consist of a string ofcharacters which represent the date and time of posting, and some(system dependent) identifier (which includes a base URL, and oftenidentifies the author, subscriber, or department which initiallyauthored the item). If an item is changed, renamed, or moved, itspermalink remains unaltered. If an item is deleted altogether, itspermalink cannot be reused. Permalinks are exploited in a number ofapplications including link tracing and link track back in Weblogs andreferences to specific Weblog entries in RSS or Atom syndicationstreams. Permalinks are supported in most modern weblogging and contentsyndication software systems, including Movable Type, LiveJournal, andBlogger.

RSS provides a standard format for the delivery of content through datafeeds. This makes it relatively straightforward for a content providerto distribute content broadly and for an affiliate to receive andprocess content from multiple sources. It will be appreciated that otherRSS-compliant and/or non-RSS-compliant feeds may be syndicated as thatterm is used herein and as is described in greater detail below. Asnoted above, the actual content may not be distributed directly, onlythe headlines, which means that users will ultimately access the contentsource 204 if they're interested in a story. It is also possible todistribute the item of content directly through RSS, though thisapproach may compromise some of the advantages of network efficiency(items are not copied and distributed in their entirety) and referraltracking. Traffic to a Web site that hosts a content source 204 canincrease in response to distribution of data feeds 202.

Although not depicted, a single content source 204 may also havemultiple data feeds 202. These may be organized topically or accordingto target clients 102. Thus, the same content may have data feeds 202for electronic mailing lists, PDAs, cell phones, and set-top boxes. Forexample, a content provider may decide to offer headlines in aPDA-friendly format, or it may create a weekly email newsletterdescribing what's new on a Web site.

Data feeds 202 in a standard format provide for significant flexibilityin how content is organized and distributed. An aggregator 210, forexample, may be provided that periodically updates data from a pluralityof data feeds 202. In general, an aggregator 210 may make many datafeeds 202 available as a single source. As a significant advantage, thisintermediate point in the content distribution chain may also be used tocustomize feeds, and presentation thereof, as well as to filter itemswithin feeds and provide any other administrative services to assistwith syndication, distribution, and review of content.

As will be described in greater detail below, the aggregator 210 mayfilter, prioritize, or otherwise process the aggregated data feeds. Asingle processed data feed 202 may then be provided to a client 102 asdepicted by an arrow 212. The client 102 may request periodic updatesfrom the data feed 202 created by the aggregator 210 as also indicatedby an arrow 212. As indicated by an arrow 213, the client 102 may alsoconfigure the aggregator 210 such as by adding data streams 202,removing data streams 202, searching for new data streams 202,explicitly filtering or prioritizing items from the data streams 202, ordesignating personal preferences or profile data that the aggregator 210may apply to generate the aggregated data feed 202. When an item ofinterest is presented in the user interface of the client 102, a usermay select a link to the item, causing the client 102 to retrieve theitem from the associated content source 204 as indicated by an arrow214. The aggregator 210 may present the data feed 202 as a static webpage that is updated only upon an explicit request from the client 102,or the aggregator 210 may push updates to a client 102 using either HTTPor related Web browser technologies, or by updates through some otherchannel, such as e-mail updates. It will also be appreciated that, whilethe aggregator 210 is illustrated as separate from the client 102, theaggregator 210 may be realized as a primarily client-side technology,where software executing on the client 102 assumes responsibility fordirectly accessing a number of data feeds 202 and aggregating/filteringresults from those feeds 202.

It will be appreciated that a user search for feeds will be improved bythe availability of well organized databases. While a number of Weblogsprovide local search functionality, and a number of aggregator servicesprovide lists of available data feeds, there remains a need for aconsumer-level searchable database of feed content. As such, one aspectof the system described herein is a database of data feeds that issearchable by contents as well as metadata such as title anddescription. In a server used with the systems described herein, theentire universe of known data feeds may be hashed or otherwise organizedinto searchable form in real time or near real time. The hash index mayinclude each word or other symbol and any data necessary to locate it ina stream and in a post.

The advent of commonly available data feeds 202, such as RSS feeds,along with tools such as aggregators 210, enables new modes ofcommunication. In one common use, a user may, through a client 102, postaggregated feeds 202 to a Weblog. The information posted on a Weblog mayinclude an aggregated feed 202, one or more data feeds 202 that aresources for the aggregated feed 202, and any personal, political,technical, or editorial comments that are significant to the author. Assuch, all participants in an RSS network may become authors or sourcesof content, as well as consumers.

FIG. 3 depicts certain aspects of the markets for data feeds. Thisgenerally depicts characteristics that can be present in a number ofdifferent markets in which the systems described herein may be usefullydeployed. Market 300 for data feeds 302 such as RSS may be understood asincluding four main models for information exchange among businessparticipants in the commercial space 302 and individuals in the consumerspace 304. As large, established companies such as Yahoo, Google, andMicrosoft adopt and integrate RSS technologies, these markets shouldgrow significantly.

At present, the consumer-to-consumer market model 306 consists primarilyof millions of individual bloggers, mostly communicating with eachother. This includes non-commercial Weblogs where individuals aggregatedata feeds 302 from a variety of sources and include editorialcommentary or other information. In general, a source in this space isan individual presenting aggregated feeds 302 in a Web site with somecommon theme or themes of interest to the author, such as history,sports, science, technology, politics, literature, art, music, and soforth. However, there are no strict requirements that any one or morethemes be followed, and the Weblog may simply reflect an ad hocselection of topics that the author finds interesting. Weblogs in thisspace gain popularity according to the content provided, with readership(and associated RSS subscriptions or registrations) rising or fallingaccording to general interest.

The consumer-to-business model or segment 308 brings together consumerswho are interested in a particular topic, typically a topic with acorresponding commercial market, such as automobiles, mortgages,financial services, home repair, hobbies, and the like. A topic may bestill more refined, such as antique automobiles, or antique Americanautomobiles; however, the corresponding participation of commercialparticipants may depend on the scope of the market. Thus, a large numberof financial service providers could be expected to subscribe to an RSSdata feed for general consumers of financial services; however, asmaller number of commercial subscribers might be expected forderivative currency hedge instruments among Pacific Rim countrycurrencies. In general, consumer-to-business uses may provide consumerswith concerns, interests, and preferences in a particular market with aforum that will be followed by corresponding commercial interests. Inaddition, by participating in this RSS network, businesses may alsoaddress consumer interests in a more direct and personal way, asdistinguished from the business-to-consumer segment 312 discussed below.At the same time, it will be appreciated that the distinction betweenthese segments 308, 312 need not be an absolute one, and a synthesis ofthese two communication channels may result in a greater dialoguebetween commercial and individual actors, to their collective and mutualbenefit. Thus, for example, with a suitably configured aggregated feed302 and associated Web presentation, an automobile manufacturer coulddesign a new minivan or SUV in cooperation with the automobile-buyingpublic in a manner that addresses previously unknown purchasingpreferences of consumers. Additionally, since the community ofparticipants is likely to be highly focused, this segment 308 may offersignificant opportunities for revenue from targeted advertising.

The business-to-business segment 310 does not appear to be commonlyused, although in the methods and systems described herein syndicationmay substitute for electronic mail and other forms of corporate andbusiness-to-business communication, such as time management, inventory,supply chain, manufacturing, and customer relations information flow.

The business-to-consumer segment 312 includes an extension oftraditional media companies that can add data feed capabilities to theironline presence. This includes news companies in print media, radio,television media, and Internet media, including, by way of example andnot limitation, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall StreetJournal, Forbes, Time, Business Week, CSPAN, ESPN, The Weather Channel,CNBC, CNET, Bloomberg, Reuters, and so on. This may also includenon-news related media that nonetheless periodically update content,such as movie studios, network television, cable television, and so on.In addition, other companies that serve consumers may also usefullyemploy data feed systems, including companies ranging from cataloguecompanies such as Land's End to consumer electronics retailers such asBest Buy. In this context, a syndication platform such as enhanced RSSoffers a reliable distribution channel for advertising new products andspecial offers to presumably interested consumers. These and otherapplications may be realized using the data feed technology describedherein.

All such entity-to-entity communications described above may be improvedthrough enhanced syndication systems as generally described herein. Itwill be appreciated that one obstacle to expanded use across all ofthese markets is the absence in the primary technology, RSS, ofenterprise-class features such as security, authentication, conditionalaccess data repositories, and rich metadata, to name a few. In oneaspect, the systems described herein bring many of these features toRSS-like systems to provide secure, scalable syndication systems.

It should be clear that, while the term “aggregator” is used to labelaspects of the systems disclosed herein, those systems includesignificant useful and advantageous functionality that is not present inany aggregator in the prior art, and as such the term should beinterpreted broadly to optionally include all of the functions andtechniques described below, rather than narrowly in the sense that it iscurrently used in the art. Although broader in meaning, the aggregatorand interface described below may operate, for example, from one of theservers 104 described above with reference to FIG. 1 and may cooperatewith other participants and content sources in the manner depicted forthe aggregator 210 described in FIG. 2.

It will be appreciated that the components described herein correspondgenerally to various areas of functionality for a data feed system.However, in various embodiments, other components may be added, orcertain components may be removed or combined with other components. Forexample, the aggregator described herein may cooperate with an n-tierarchitecture for a more general purpose Web server or with a relationaldatabase or other back end systems not specifically depicted herein tostore and access data. Similarly, the systems described herein mayinclude FTP servers, e-mail servers, PSTN interfaces, and other physicalconnections and protocols for various other functions that may beusefully combined with the aggregator to enhance functionality. Anynumber of such combinations and variations may be employed consistentwith the systems described herein and are intended to fall within thescope of the present disclosure.

It will also be appreciated that a wide range of software and hardwareplatforms may be used to deploy the systems described herein. Generally,the system components may be realized in hardware, software, or somecombination of these. The components may be realized in one or moremicroprocessors, microcontrollers, embedded microcontrollers,programmable digital signal processors or other programmable devices,along with internal and/or external memory such as read-only memory,programmable read-only memory, electronically erasable programmableread-only memory, random access memory, dynamic random access memory,double data rate random access memory, Rambus direct random accessmemory, flash memory, or any other volatile or non-volatile memory forstoring program instructions, program data, and program output or otherintermediate or final results. The components may also, or instead,include one or more application specific integrated circuits (ASICs),dedicated semiconductor devices, programmable gate arrays, programmablearray logic devices, or any other device that may be configured toprocess electronic signals.

Any combination of the above circuits and components, whether packageddiscretely, as a chip, as a chip set, or as a die, may be suitablyadapted to use with the systems described herein. It will further beappreciated that the above components may be realized as computerexecutable code created using a structured programming language such asC, an object oriented programming language such as C++, or any otherhigh-level or low-level programming language that may be compiled orinterpreted to run on one of the above devices, as well as heterogeneouscombinations of processors, processor architectures, or combinations ofdifferent hardware and software.

FIG. 4 depicts a conceptual framework for syndicated communications. Ina syndication system 400, a plurality of sources 402, which may be forexample any of the content sources 204 described above, are published toa plurality of users 404, which may be users of any of the clients 102described above. Users 404 may include individuals, consumers, businessentities, government entities, workgroups, and other categories of users404. Access to the sources 402 by the users 404 may be through layers ofdevices, services, and systems (which may be analogous to or actuallyembodied in a protocol stack) in which various layers are responsiblefor discrete functions or services, as depicted generally in FIG. 4.However, it will be appreciated that each layer of FIG. 4 may instead beprovided as one or more non-layered services. This may include, forexample, deployment as services in a Services Oriented Architecture orother Web-based or similar environment where individual services may belocated and called from remote locations. This may also, or instead,include deployment in a fixed architecture where a specific collectionof services or functions, such as atomic functions, is deployed eitherlocally or in a distributed manner and accessible through a syntax suchas an instruction set. The functions within the conceptual framework mayalso be deployed within a web application framework such as Ruby onRails or any other open source or proprietary application framework.Thus, numerous architectures and variations are possible for deployingthe functions and operations described herein, and all such arrangementsare intended to fall within the scope of this disclosure.

At the same time, it should be understood that the number, arrangement,and functions of the layers may be varied in a number of ways within asyndication system 400; in particular, depending on the characteristicsof the sources, the needs of the users 404 and the features desired forparticular applications, a number of improved configurations forsyndication systems 404 may be established, representing favorablecombinations and sub-combinations of layers depicted in FIG. 4. Thelayers may provide services such as, for example, services related toapplications 406, other services 408 (including relating to processing),services related to data 410, services related to semantics of content412, syndication services 414, and services related to infrastructure416. More generally, all of the services and functions described below,either individual or in combinations, as well as other services notspecifically mentioned, may be incorporated into an enhanced syndicationsystem as described herein. It should be understood that any of theservices depicted in the layers of FIG. 4 may be embodied in hardware,software, firmware, or a combination thereof; for example, a service maybe embodied in software as a web service, according to a servicesoriented architecture. Alternatively, without limitation, a service maybe a client-side or server-side application or take any of the formsdescribed herein and in the documents incorporated by reference herein.In one embodiment, one or more layers may be embodied in a dedicatedsemiconductor device, such as an ASIC, that is configured to enablesyndication.

Services related to applications 406 may be embodied, for example, in aclient-side application (including commercially available applicationssuch as a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation software, databasesystem, task management system, supply chain management system,inventory management system, human resources management system, userinterface system, operating system, graphics system, computer game,electronic mail system, calendar system, media player, and the like), aremote application or service, an application layer of an enhancedsyndication services protocol stack, a web service, a service orientedarchitecture service, a Java applet, or a combination of these.Applications 406 may include, for example, a user interface, socialnetworking, vertical market applications, media viewers, transactionprocessing, alerts, event-action pairs, analysis, and so forth.Applications 406 may also accommodate vertical market uses of otheraspects of the system 400 by integrating various aspects of, forexample, security, interfaces, databases, syndication, and the like.Examples of vertical markets include financial services, health care,electronic commerce, communications, advertising, sales, marketing,supply chain management, retail, accounting, professional services, andso forth. In one aspect, the applications 406 may include socialnetworking tools to support functions such as sharing and pooling ofsyndicated content, content filters, content sources, contentcommentary, and the like, as well as formation of groups, affiliations,and the like. Social networking tools may support dynamic creation ofcommunities and moderation of dialogues within communities, whileproviding individual participants with any desired level of anonymity.Social networking tools may also, or instead, evaluate popularity offeeds or items in a syndication network or permit user annotation,evaluation, or categorization. A user interface from the application mayalso complement other services layers. For example, an application mayprovide a user interface that interprets semantic content to determineone or more display characteristics for associated items of syndicatedcontent.

Other services 408 may include any other services not specificallyidentified herein that may be usefully employed within an enhancedsyndication system. For example, content from the sources 402 may beformatted for display through a formatting service that interpretsvarious types of data and determines an arrangement and format suitablefor display. This may also include services that are specificallyidentified, which may be modified, enhanced, or adapted to differentuses through the other services 408. Other services 408 may support oneor more value added services. For example, a security service mayprovide for secure communications among users or from users to sources.An identity service may provide verification of user or sourceidentities, such as by reference to a trusted third party. Anauthentication service may receive user credentials and control accessto various sources 402 or other services 408 within the system. Afinancial transaction service may execute financial transactions amongusers 404 or between users 404 and sources 402. Any service amenable tocomputer implementation may be deployed as one or more other services408, either alone or in combination with services from other elements ofthe system 400.

Data services 410 may be embodied, for example, in a client-sideapplication, a remote application or service, an application layer of anenhanced syndication services protocol stack, as application servicesdeployed, for example, in the services oriented architecture describedbelow, or a combination of these. Data services 410 may include, forexample, search, query, view, extract, or any other database functions.Data services 410 may also, or instead, include data quality functionssuch as data cleansing, deduplication, and the like. Data services 410may also, or instead, include transformation functions for transformingdata between data repositories or among presentation formats. Thus, forexample, data may be transformed from entries in a relational database,or items within an OPML outline, into a presentation format such as MSWord, MS Excel, or MS PowerPoint. Similarly, data may be transformedfrom a source such as an OPML outline into a structured database. Dataservices 410 may also, or instead, include syndication-specificfunctions such as searching of data feeds, or items within data feeds,or filtering items for relevance from within selected feeds, orclustering groups of searches and/or filters for republication as anaggregated and/or filtered content source 402. In one aspect, a dataservice 410 as described herein provides a repository of historical datafeeds, which may be combined with other services for user-configurablepublication of aggregated, filtered, and/or annotated feeds. Moregenerally, data services 410 may include any functions associated withdata including storing, manipulating, retrieving, transforming,verifying, authenticating, formatting, reformatting, tagging, linking,hyperlinking, reporting, viewing, and so forth. A search engine deployedwithin the data services 410 may permit searching of data feeds or, witha content database as described herein, searching or filtering ofcontent within data feeds from sources 402. Data services 410 may beadapted for use with databases such as commercially available databasesfrom Oracle, Microsoft, IBM, and/or open source databases such as MySQLAB or PostgreSQL.

In one aspect, data services 410 may include services for searching anddisplaying collections of OPML or other XML-based documents. This mayinclude a collection of user interface tools for finding, building,viewing, exploring, and traversing a knowledge structure inherent orembedded in a collection of interrelated or cross-linked documents. Sucha system has particular utility, for example, in creating a structuredknowledge directory of OPML structures derived from an exploration ofrelationships among individual outlined OPML documents and the nodesthereof (such as end nodes that do not link to further content). In oneembodiment, the navigation and building of knowledge structures mayadvantageously be initiated from any point within a knowledge structure,such as an arbitrarily selected OPML document within a tree. A userinterface including the tools described generally above may allow a userto restrict a search to specific content types, such as RSS, podcasts(which may be recognized, e.g., by presence of RSS with an MP3 or WAVattachment) or other OPML links within the corpus of OPML filessearched. The interface may be supported by a searchable database ofOPML content, which may in turn be fed by one or more OPML spiders thatseek to continually update content either generally or within a specificdomain (i.e., an enterprise, a top-level domain name, a computer, or anyother domain that can be defined for operation of a spider. The OPMLgenerated by an OPML search engine may also be searchable, permitting,e.g., recovery of lost links to OPML content.

It will be appreciated that by storing an entire knowledge structure (orentire portions thereof), the tree structure may be navigated in eitherdirection. That is, a tree may be navigated downward in a hierarchy(which is possible with conventional outlines) as well as upward in ahierarchy (which is not supported directly by OPML). Upward navigationbecomes possible with reference to a stored version of the knowledgestructure, and the navigation system may include techniques forresolving upward references (e.g. where two different OPML documentsrefer to the same object) using explicit user selections, pre-programmedpreferences, or other selection criteria, as well as combinationsthereof.

Data services 410 may include access to a database management system(DBMS). In one aspect, the DBMS may provide management of syndicatedcontent. In another aspect, the DBMS may support a virtual database ofdistributed data. The DBMS may allow a user, such as a human or anautomatic computer program, to perform operations on a data feed,references to the data feed, metadata associated with the data feed, andthe like. Thus in one aspect, a DBMS is provided for syndicated content.Operations on the data managed by the DBMS may be expressed inaccordance with a query language, such as SQL, XQuery, or any otherdatabase query language. In some embodiments, the query language may beemployed to describe operations on a data feed, on an aggregate of datafeeds, or on a distributed set of data feeds. It should be appreciatedthat the data feeds may be structured according to RSS, OPML, or anyother syndicated data format. In another aspect, content such as OPMLcontent may describe a relationship among distributed data, and the dataservices 410 may provide a virtual DBMS interface to the distributeddata. Thus, there is disclosed herein an OPML-based database whereindata relationships are encoded in OPML and data are stored as contentdistributed among resources referenced by the OPML.

The data services 410 may include database transactions. Each databasetransaction may include an atomic set of reads and/or writes to thedatabase. The transaction mechanism for the database transactions maysupport concurrent and/or conditional access to the data in thedatabase. Conditional access may support privacy, security, dataintegrity, and the like within the database. The transaction mechanismmay allow a plurality of users to concurrently read, write, create,delete, perform a query, or perform any other operation supported by theDMBS against an RSS feed or OPML file, either of which may be supportedby the data in the database or support a database infrastructure. In oneaspect, the transaction mechanism may avoid or resolve conflictingoperations and maintain the consistency of the database. The transactionmechanism may be adapted to support availability, scalability, mobility,serializability, and/or convergence of a DBMS. The transaction mechanismmay also, or instead, support version control or revision control. TheDBMS may additionally or alternatively provide methods and systems forproviding access control, record locking, conflict resolution, avoidanceof list updates, avoidance of system delusion, avoidance of scaleuppitfall, and the like.

The data services 410 may provide an interface to a DBMS that functionsas a content source by publishing or transmitting a data feed to aclient. The DBMS may additionally or alternatively perform as a clientby accessing or receiving a data feed from a content source. The DBMSmay perform as an aggregator of feeds. The DBMS may provide asyndication service. The DBMS may perform as an element in aservice-oriented architecture. The DBMS may accept and/or provide datathat are formatted according to XML, OPML, HTML, RSS, or any othermarkup language.

Semantics 412, or semantic processing, may include any functions orservices associated with the meaning of content from the sources 402 andmay be embodied, for example, in a client-side application, a remoteapplication or service, an application layer of an enhanced syndicationservices protocol stack, as application services deployed, for example,in the services oriented architecture described below, or a combinationof these. Semantics 412 may include, for example, interrelating contentinto a knowledge structure using, for example, OPML, adding metadata orenriching current metadata, interpreting or translating content, and soforth. Semantics 412 may also include parsing content, eitherlinguistically for substantive or grammatical analysis, orprogrammatically for generation of executable events. Semantics 412 mayinclude labeling data feeds and items within feeds, either automaticallyor manually. This may also include interpretation of labels or othermetadata, and automated metadata enrichment. Semantics 412 may alsoprovide a semantic hierarchy for categorizing content according touser-specified constraints or against a fixed dictionary or knowledgestructure. Generally, any function relating to the categorization,interpretation, or labeling of content may be performed within asemantic layer, which may be used, for example, by users 404 tointerpret content or by sources 402 to self-identify content.Categorization may be based on one or more factors, such as popularity,explicit user categorization, interpretation or analysis of textual,graphical, or other content, relationship to other items (such asthrough an outline or other hierarchical description), content type(e.g., file type), content metadata (e.g., author, source, distributionchannel, time of publication, etc.) and so forth. Currently availabletools for semantic processing include OPML, dictionaries, thesauruses,and metadata tagging. Current tools also include an array of linguisticanalysis tools which may be deployed as a semantic service or used by asemantic service. These and other tools may be employed to evaluatesemantic content of an item, including the body and metadata thereof,and to add or modify semantic information accordingly.

It will be understood that, while OPML is one specific outlininggrammar, any similar grammar, whether XML-based, ASCII-based, or thelike, may be employed, provided it offers a manner for explicitlyidentifying hierarchies and/or relationships among items within adocument and/or among documents. Where the grammar is XML-based, it isreferred to herein as an outlining markup language.

Semantics 412 may be deployed, for example, as a semantic serviceassociated with a syndication platform or service. The semantic servicemay be, for example, a web service, a service in a services orientedarchitecture, a layer of a protocol stack, a client-side or server-sideapplication, or any of the other technologies described herein, as wellas various combinations of these. The semantic service may offer avariety of forms of automated, semi-automated, or manual semanticanalysis of items of syndicated content, including feeds or channelsthat provide such items. The semantic service may operate in one or moreways with syndicated content. In one aspect, the semantic service mayoperate on metadata within the syndicated content, as generally notedabove. The semantic service may also, or instead, store metadataindependent from the syndicated content, such as in a database, whichmay be publicly accessible or privately used by a value-added semanticservice provider or the like. The semantic service may also or insteadspecify relationships among items of syndicated content using anoutlining service such as OPML. In general, an outlining service,outlining markup language, outlining syntax, or the like, provides astructured grammar for specifying relationships such as hierarchicalrelationships among items of content. The relationship may, for example,be a tree or other hierarchical structure that may be self-defined by anumber of discrete relationships among individual items within the tree.Any number of such outlines may be provided in an outline-based semanticservice.

By way of an example of use of a semantic service, a plurality of itemsof syndicated content, such as news items relating to a corporateentity, may be aggregated for presentation as a data feed. Othercontent, such as stored data items, may be associated with the data feedusing an outline markup language so that an outline provided by thesemantic service includes current events relating to a corporate entity,along with timely data from a suitable data source such as stock quotes,bond prices, or any other financial instrument data (e.g., privatelyheld securities, stock options, futures contracts), and also publiclyavailable data such as SEC filings including quarterly reports, annualreports, or other event reports. All of these data sources may becollected for a company using an outline that structures the aggregateddata and provides pointers to a current source of data where the datamight change (such as stock quotes or SEC filings). Thus an outline mayprovide a fixed, structured, and current view of the corporate entitywhere data from different sources changes with widely varyingfrequencies. Of course other content, such as message boards, discussiongroups, and the like may be incorporated into the outline, along withrelatively stable content such as a web site URL for the entity.

Syndication 414 may include any functions or services associated with apublish-subscribe environment and may be embodied, for example, in aclient-side application, a remote application or service, an applicationlayer of an enhanced syndication services protocol stack, as applicationservices deployed, for example, in the services oriented architecturedescribed below, or a combination of these. Syndication 412 may includesyndication specific functions such as publication, subscription,aggregation, republication, and, more generally, management ofsyndication information (e.g., source, date, author, and the like). Onecommonly employed syndication system is RSS, although it will beappreciated from the remaining disclosure that a wide array of enhancedsyndication services may provided in cooperation with, or separate from,an RSS infrastructure.

Infrastructure 416 may include any low level functions associated withenhanced syndication services and may be embodied, for example, in aclient-side application, a remote application or service, an applicationlayer of an enhanced syndication services protocol stack, as applicationservices deployed, for example, in the services oriented architecturedescribed below, or a combination of these. Infrastructure 416 maysupport, for example, security, authentication, traffic management,logging, pinging, communications, reporting, time and date services, andthe like.

In one embodiment, the infrastructure 416 may include a communicationsinterface adapted for wireless delivery of RSS content. RSS content istypically developed for viewing by a conventional, full-sized computerscreen; however, users increasingly view web content, including RSSfeeds, using wireless devices, such as cellular phones, Personal DigitalAssistants (“PDAs”), wireless electronic mail devices such asBlackberrys, and the like. In many cases content that is suitable for anormal computer screen is not appropriate for a small screen; forexample, the amount of text that can be read on the screen is reduced.Accordingly, embodiments of the invention include formatting RSS feedsfor wireless devices. In particular, embodiments of the inventioninclude methods and systems for providing content to a user, includingtaking a feed of RSS content, determining a user interface format for awireless device, and reformatting the RSS content for the user interfacefor the wireless device. In embodiments the content may be dynamicallyreformatted based on the type of wireless device.

In embodiments, tags from an RSS feed can be used to feed a template,such as an XML-enabled template, that further modifies the RSS feedbased on the nature of a wireless device. For example, the abstract ofan RSS feed can be delivered in a shortened format, such as identifyingand delivering the first sentence of the abstract. An RSS feed can alsobe broken up into sub-segments, and a user can be provided with a linkwithin the feed for requesting additional sub-segments, or additionalportions of the feed, thus permitting a user to control content deliverywhere, for example, the user has a bandwidth-constrained ordisplay-constrained device. In embodiments the link may be interactiveand may be activated or manipulated by a user with a control such as abutton, thumbpad, touchscreen, dial button, or stylus.

In embodiments an RSS feed may further comprise inserting a phone numberinto the feed, wherein interacting with the phone number on a cellularphone or other telecommunications-capable device initiates a telephonecall. The telephone call could be to a content source, so as to allow auser to hear a voice rendition of the content of the RSS feed, to hearrelated content, such as programming related to the RSS feed, toinitiate a transaction, such as related to the content of the RSS feed,to request a particular type of additional information, to allow theuser to subscribe to the feed, or the like.

In embodiments the RSS feed may include a time-related component, suchas a schedule for the delivery of additional content. In embodiments thetime-related component may be fed to a calendar, task list, or relatedfacility, thus setting an appointment related to the time-relatedcomponent in a user's electronic calendar, such as on a handheld deviceor on a conventional personal computer or laptop computer.

In embodiments an RSS feed may be provided with a separate layer ofsecurity that is associated with a security facility of a wirelessdevice. For example, an RSS feed may be encrypted so that it may only beread by a specific type of wireless device, a specific wireless device,or on a specific wireless device only after entry of a password that isissued to a known user of that wireless device. In embodiments securitymay be associated with a location facility of the wireless device (suchas GPS, cellular triangulation, or the like), so as to allow a user toaccess an RSS feed only if the user is physically located in aparticular place. For example, a user attending a live concert or otherevent might be permitted to view an RSS feed about the concert, butother users might be excluded from that content, creating a secure newmedia channel for event attendees.

In embodiments a user interface for a wireless or handheld device may becustomized to include menus that specifically relate to RSS content. Forexample, an interface may be provided with a separate RSS menu icon,drop down selection, or the like for allowing a user to place such adevice in an RSS mode. Within an RSS mode, initiated by an RSS menuoption, a user may be provided with options to take actions related toRSS, such as subscribing to feeds, selecting feeds from a set of feeds,prioritizing feeds, selecting feeds as favorites, or the like. Inembodiments, an RSS mode may include a menu item for each of (or asubset of) the components of the RSS schema. For example, a menu icon,drop down item, or the like may allow a user to select and view thetitle of an RSS feed, the abstract, text, the authors, or other content.In embodiments the user interface of a wireless or handheld device mayhave an RSS search icon, menu, or screen that returns RSS results inresponse to entry of a keyword. In embodiments results may be returnedthat include commercial and non-commercial result sets, which may bedistinguished on the screen, such as by screen location, by an icon thatidentifies them as such, or by another indicator of the distinction,such as color, font, underlining, italics, boldface type, highlighting,or the like.

Thus, in embodiments an RSS-customized user interface for a wirelesshandheld device is provided.

In another aspect, the infrastructure 416 may include improved pingingsystems. The only current form of network service in an RSS environmentis a primitive system of “pings”, such as those provided by weblogs.com,that permit users to track changes and updates to content. When aproducer updates its RSS output file, a message is sent to a centralfile server. When consumers want to know if there are updated RSSoutputs from particular sources they go to the central file and see ifthere is a recent message from the producer of choice, rather thanretrieving the RSS source directly. When new content is available, theconsumer may send an electronic request directly to the producer'soutput file and read the contents into the consumers local files,archive, or repository. The infrastructure 416 for an enhancedsyndication system may provide improved pinging systems. For example, acentral server may be secure. In such a system, each request for a pingmay carry an encryption-based key for the requestor. Responses to thatrequestor, which may be verified, for example with reference to atrusted third party, or using some other technique, may be time boundwith constraints on start times, stop times, frequency, quotas, or thelike. In another embodiment, the requester may simply use a uniqueidentification number. Pings may be subscription based, so that afor-fee pinger may be used more frequently than a free pinger. Thusthere is disclosed herein a secure pinger for use in an RSS system. Alsodisclosed herein is a managed pinger, which may limit ping responsesaccording to subscription levels, frequency, or any other suitablecriteria.

The infrastructure 416 may more generally provide traffic managementservices including but not limited to real time monitoring of messagelatency, traffic and congestion, and packet quality across a network ofend-to-end RSS exchanges and relationships. This may include real timemonitoring of special traffic problems such as denial of service attacksor overload of network capabilities. Another service may beQuality-of-Service management that provides a publisher with the abilityto manage time of sending of signaling messages for pingers, time ofavailability of the signaled-about messages, and unique identifierswhich apply to the signaling message and the signaled-about message ormessages. This may also include quality of service attributes for thesignaled-about message or messages and criteria for selecting end usercomputers that are to be treated to particular levels of end-to-endquality of service. This may be, for example, a commercial service inwhich users pay for higher levels of QoS.

It will be generally appreciated that the arrangement of layers andinterfaces may vary; however, in one embodiment syndication 414 maycommunicate directly with sources 402 while the applications 406 maycommunicate directly with users 404. Thus, in one aspect, the systemsdescribed herein enable enhanced syndication systems by providing aconsistent framework for consumption and republication of content byusers 404. In general, existing technologies such as RSS provideadequate syndication services, but additional elements of a syndicationsystem 400, such as social networking and semantic content management,have been provided only incrementally and only on an ad hoc basis fromspecific service providers. The functions and services described abovemay be realized through, for example, the services oriented architecturedescribed below with reference to FIG. 5 and/or any of the markuplanguages described below with reference to FIG. 6.

In one example a model of an end-to-end content syndication system for,e.g., RSS, OPML, or other content, may include the following elements:convert, structure, store, spider, pool, search, filter, cluster, route,and run. Conversion may transform data (bi-directionally) betweenapplication-specific or database-specific formats and the syndication oroutlining format. Structure may be derived from the content, such as aknowledge structure inherent in interrelated OPML outlines, or metadatacontained in RSS tags. Storage may occur locally on a user device or ata remote repository. Spiders may be employed to search repositories andlocal data on user devices, to the extent that it is made publiclyavailable or actively published. Pools of data may be formed at centralrepositories or archives. Searches may be conducted across one or morepools of data. Filters may be employed to select specific data feeds,items within a data feed, or elements of an OPML tree structure.Specific items or OPML tree branches may be clustered based uponexplicit search criteria, inferences from metadata or content, orcommunity rankings or commentary. Routing may permit combinations amongcontent from various content sources using, e.g., web services orsuperservices. Such combinations may be run to generate correspondingdisplays of results. Other similar or different combinations of elementsfrom the broad categories above may be devised according to variousvalue chains or other conceptual models of syndication services.

More generally, well-defined interfaces between a collection of discretemodules for an established value chain may permit independentdevelopment, improvement, adaptation, and/or customization of modules byend users or commercial entities. This may include configurations offeatures within a module (which might be usefully shared with others,for example), as well as functional changes to underlying software.

For example, an author may wish to use any one or more of a number ofenvironments to create content for syndication. By providing a modulewith a standardized interface to RSS posting, converters may be createdfor that module to convert between application formats and an RSS-readyformat. This may free contributors to create content in any desiredformat and, with suitable converters, readily transform the content intoRSS-ready material. Thus disparate applications such as Microsoft Word,Excel, and Outlook may be used to generate content, with the authorleveraging off features of those applications (such as spell checking,grammar checking, calculation capabilities, scheduling capabilities, andso on). The content may then be converted into RSS material andpublished to an RSS feed. As a significant advantage, users may work inan environment in which they are comfortable and simply obtain neededconverters to supply content to the RSS network. As a result,contributors may be able to more efficiently produce source material ofhigher quality. Tagging tools may also be incorporated into this module(or some author module) to provide any degree of automation andstandardization desired by an author for categorization of content.

As another example, appropriate characterization of RSS material remainsa constantly growing problem. However, if tagging occurs at a known andpredictable point in the RSS chain, e.g., within a specific module, thenany number of useful applications may be constructed within, or incommunication with, that module to assist with tagging. For example, alluntagged RSS posts may be extracted from feeds and pooled at a commonlyaccessible location where one or more people may resolve tagging issues.Or the module may automatically resolve tagging recommendationscontributed by readers of the item. Different rules may be constructedfor different streams of data, according to editorial demands orcommunity preferences. In short, maintaining a separate tagging module,or fixing the tagging function at a particular module within the chain,permits a wide array of tagging functions which may be coordinated withother aspects of the RSS chain.

In another aspect, a well-defined organization of modules permitsimproved synchronization or coordination of different elements of themodules in the RSS chain. Thus for example centralized aggregators maybe provided to improve usability or to improve the tagging of contentwith metadata, where a combination of lack of standards and constantlyevolving topics has frustrated attempts to normalize tagging vocabulary.By explicitly separating tagging from content, visibility of taggingbehavior may be improved and yield better tag selection by contentauthors. Similarly, search techniques (mapping and exploration) may befully separated from indexing (pre-processing) to permit independentimprovements in each.

A well-established “backplane” or other communications system forcooperating RSS modules (or other data feeds) may enable a number ofbusiness processes or enterprise applications, particularly if coupledwith identity/security/role management, which may be incorporated intothe backplane, or various modules connected thereto, to control accessto data feeds.

For example, a document management system may be provided using anenhanced RSS system. Large companies, particularly document intensivecompanies such as professional services firms, including accountingfirms, law firms, consulting firms, and financial services firms, employsophisticated document management systems that provide uniqueidentifiers and metadata for each new document created by employees.Each new document may also, for example, be added to an RSS feed. Thismay occur at any identifiable point during the document's life, such aswhen first stored, when mailed, when printed, or at any other time. Byviewing the RSS feed with, for example, topical filters, an individualmay filter the stream of new documents for items of interest. Thus, forexample, a partner at a law firm may remain continuously updated on allexternal correspondence relating to SEC Regulation FD, compliance withSarbanes Oxley, or any other matter of interest. Alternatively, apartner may wish to see all documents relating to a certain client.Similarly, a manager at a brokerage house may wish to monitor all tradesof more than a certain number of shares for a certain stock. Or anaccountant may wish to see all internal memoranda relating to revisionsto depreciation allowances in the federal tax code. An enhanced RSSsystem may provide any number of different perspectives on newly createdcontent within an organization.

Other enterprise-wide applications may be created. For example, ahospital may place all prescriptions written by physicians at thehospital into an RSS feed. This data may be viewed and analyzed toobtain a chronological view of treatment.

In one aspect, functions within the conceptual framework may include agroup of atomic functions which may be accessed with a correspondingsyntax. Arrangements of such calls into higher-level, more complexoperations, may also be expressed in a file such as an OPML file, an XMLfile, or any other suitable grammar. Effectively, these groups ofinstructions may form programmatic expressions which may be stored forpublication, re-use, and combination with other programmaticexpressions. Data for these programmatic expressions may be separatelystored in another physical location, in a separate partition at alocation of the instructions, or together with the instructions. In oneaspect, OPML may provide a grammar for expression of functionalrelationships, and RSS may provide a grammar for data. Thus the samecomplex operation may be re-executed against different data sets oragainst data in a syndicated feed that periodically updates. Thus, inone aspect, an architecture is provided for microprocessor-styledprogramming across distributed data and instructions.

FIG. 5 depicts a system for delivering services in a syndication system.As depicted, one technology for delivering services within theconceptual framework above is a service-oriented architecture. Aservice-oriented architecture (“SOA”) 500 may include a servicerequester 502, a service provider 504, and a service broker 508.

In general, the service requester 502, which may be any of the clients102 described above, discovers services and receives servicedescriptions through an exchange with the service broker 508 using asuitable syntax such as the Web Services Description Language (“WSDL”).The service provider 504 publishes service descriptions to the servicebroker 508, also using a syntax such as WSDL. The service requester 502uses a service through communications with the service provider 504,using a transport protocol such as Simple Object Access Protocol(“SOAP”). An SOA 500 may include any number of requesters 502, brokers508, and providers 504. Additionally, a number of protocols andstandards may be employed to orchestrate the deployment of services inan SOA 500. In a web services embodiment, the Web service protocol stackis employed to define, locate, implement, and interact with Webservices. In general, this includes four main areas: service transport,XML messaging, service description, and service discovery. Servicetransport transports messages among network applications using protocolssuch as HyperText Transport Protocol (“HTTP”), File Transfer Protocol(“FTP”), Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (“SMTP”), and more recently theBlocks Extensible Exchange Protocol (“BEEP”). XML messaging encodesmessages in a common XML format using, for example, XML-RPC, SOAP, andREST. The service description is used to describe the public interfacefor services, typically using WSDL as noted above. Service discovery mayuse WSDL, along with Universal Description, Discovery, and Integration(“UDDI”), which provides a platform independent, XML-based registry forpublic Internet listings.

An SOA 500 architecture may be used, for example, in an enhancedsyndication system to relate metadata in an item of content to servicesthat are available from the registry. Thus, for example, a publiclyavailable registry may provide, among other things, a number of viewersfor graphical images. An RSS item may refer to an image source, such asan MRI image in a medical record from a hospital, and may specify aviewer for the source image that is available through the registry. Inoperation, a client with appropriate permission to view the image (alsoas managed, e.g., through the metadata for the enhanced syndicationsystem), may retrieve the appropriate viewer service from the registryand apply the viewer to view the source image. In this example, viewersmay be freely provided or may be licensed and made available through theregistry on a fee per use basis or some other licensing terms.Similarly, the image source may be made available in variousresolutions, each available under a different fee structure. In otherembodiments, textual sources may be available in various forms rangingfrom a title and biographical data to an abstract to the full text ofthe source. Thus the SOA platform may be used to resell content from anRSS archive, using viewer or access privilege services made availablethrough the registry. Other aspects such as identity and affiliation, aswell as verification of these, may be made available as services in theSOA 500.

FIG. 6 shows an XML environment for syndication systems. As representedin FIG. 6, an XML environment 600 includes data 602, which may be any ofthe content sources or other data sources described above that interactswith services 604, which may execute on a client 102, a server 104, orany other entity within a network.

Services 604, which may be, for example, any of the services describedabove with reference to FIG. 4, may employ a variety of standards,protocols, and programming languages to interact meaningfully with thedata 602. This includes, for example, the use of programming tools thatpermit program logic to be deployed in, e.g., Java, Windows, Perl, PHP,C/C++, and so on. This also includes parsing, processing, and databaseaccess using, e.g., data binding (mapping XML components into nativeformats of various programming languages), Document Object Model (“DOM”,a programming interface for manipulation of XML/HTML as programobjects), Simple API for XML (“SAX”, another API for XML documents), XSL(a stylesheet expression language), XSL Transformations (“XSLT”, alanguage for transforming XML documents into other XML documents), XMLPath Language (“XPATH”, a language for referring to parts of XMLdocuments), XSL Formatting Objects (“XSL-FO”, an XML vocabulary forformatting semantics), and a variety of tools for queries and otheraccess to commercial databases. Further, presentation may be providedusing, e.g., XHTML, CSS/XSL-FO, SMIL, WSUI, and a host of otherpresentation tools. Services 604 may also employ various otherXML-oriented tools for messaging, metadata, and web services, includingSOAP, XML-RPC, RDF, UDDI, WSDL, and the like. Other specifications, suchas the Voice eXtensible Markup Language (VoiceXML), Security ServicesMarkup Language (S2ML), and OASIS Security Assertion Markup Language(SAML), provide special purpose grammars for specific functions. Ingeneral, these tools in various combinations permit a relativelyarbitrary deployment of functions as services on top of content,structured using XML grammars.

The services 604 may interact with data 602 through one or moreestablished grammars, such as a secure markup language 610, a financemarkup language 612, WSDL 614, the Outline Programming Markup Language(“OPML”) 616, or other markup languages 620 based upon XML 608, which isa species of the Standard Generalized Markup Language (“SGML”) 606. Theinteraction may be also, or instead, through non-XML grammars such asHTML 624 (which is a species of SGML) or other formats 630. Moregenerally, a wide array of XML schemas has been devised forindustry-specific and application-specific environments. For example,XML.org lists the following vertical industries with registered XMLschemas, including the number of registered schemas in parentheses, allof which may be usefully combined with the systems described herein, andare hereby incorporated by reference in their entirety: Accounting (14),Advertising (6), Aerospace (20), Agriculture (3), Arts/Entertainment(24), Astronomy (14), Automotive (14), Banking (10), Biology (9),Business Reporting (2), Business Services (3), Catalogs (9), Chemistry(4), Computer (9), Construction (8), Consulting (20), Customer Relation(8), Customs (2), Databases (11), E-Commerce (60), EDI (18), ERP (4),Economics (2), Education (51), Energy/Utilities (35), Environmental (1),Financial Service (53), Food Services (3), Geography (5), Healthcare(25), Human Resources (23), Industrial Control (5), Insurance (6),Internet/Web (35), Legal (10), Literature (14), Manufacturing (8),Marketing/PR (1), Math/Data, Mining (10), Multimedia (26), News (12),Other Industry (12), Professional Service (6), Public Service (5),Publishing/Print (28), Real Estate (16), Religion, Retail (6),Robotics/AI (5), Science (64), Security (4), Social Sciences (4),Software (129), Supply Chain (23), Telecommunications (26), Translation(7), Transportation (10), Travel (4), Waste Management, Weather (6),Wholesale, and XML Technologies (238).

Syndication services, described in more detail below, may operate in anXML environment through a syndication markup language 632, which maysupport syndication-specific functions through a corresponding datastructure. One example of a currently used syndication markup language632 is RSS. However, it will be appreciated that a syndication markuplanguage (“SML”) as described herein may include any structure suitablefor syndication, including RSS, RSS with extensions (RSS+), RSS withoutcertain elements (RSS−), RSS with variations to elements (RSS′), orvarious combinations of these (e.g., RSS′−, RSS′+). Furthermore, an SML632 may incorporate features from other markup languages, such as afinancial markup language 612 and/or a secure markup language 610, ormay be used in cooperation with these other markup languages 620. Moregenerally, various combinations of XML schemas may be employed toprovide syndication with enhanced services as described herein in an XMLenvironment. It will be noted from the position of SML 632 in the XMLenvironment that SML 632 may be XML-based, SGML-based, or employ someother grammar for services 604 related to syndication. All suchvariations to the syndication markup language 632 as may be usefullyemployed with the systems described herein are intended to fall withinthe scope of this disclosure and may be used in a syndication system asthat term is used herein.

According to the foregoing, there is disclosed herein an enhancedsyndication system. In one aspect, the enhanced syndication systempermits semantic manipulation of syndicated content. In another aspect,the enhanced syndication system offers a social networking interfacewhich permits various user interactions without a need to directlyaccess underlying syndication technologies and the details thereof. Inanother aspect, a wide variety of additional services may be deployed incombination with syndicated content to enable new uses of syndicatedcontent. In another aspect, persistence may be provided to transientsyndicated content by the provision of a database or archive of datafeeds, and particularly the content of data feeds, which may besearched, filtered, or otherwise investigated and manipulated in asyndication network. Such a use of a syndication system with apersistent archive of data feeds and items therein is now described ingreater detail.

The syndication markup language 632, or the syndication markup language632 in combination with other supporting markup languages and othergrammars including but not limited to RSS, OPML, XML and/or any otherdefinition, grammar, syntax, or format, either fixed or extensible, allas described in more detail below, may support syndication-relatedcommunications and functions. Syndication communications may generallyoccur through an internetwork between a subscriber and a publisher, withvarious searching, filtering, sorting, archiving, modifying, and/oroutlining of information as described herein.

Two widely known message definitions for syndicated communications areRSS 2.0 (RSS) and the Atom Syndication Format Draft Version 9 (Atom, assubmitted to the IETF on Jun. 7, 2005 in the form of an Internet-Draft).A syndication message definition, as used herein, will be understood toinclude these definitions as well as variations, modifications,extensions, simplifications, and the like as described generally herein.Thus, a syndication message definition will be understood to include thevarious XML specifications and other grammars described herein and maysupport corresponding functions and capabilities that may or may notinclude the conventional publish-subscribe operations of syndication. Asyndication definition may be described in terms of XML or any othersuitable standardized or proprietary format. XML, for example, is awidely accepted standard of the Internet community that may convenientlyoffer a human-readable and machine-readable format. Alternatively, thesyndication definition may be described according to another syntaxand/or formal grammar.

For purposes of establishing a general vocabulary, and not by way oflimitation, components of syndicated communications are now described ingreater detail.

A message instance, or message, may conform to a message definition,which may be an abstract, typed definition. The abstract, typeddefinition may be expressed, for example, in terms of an XML schema,which may without limitation comprise XML's built-in Document TypeDefinition (DTD), XML Schema, RELAX NG, and so forth. In some cases,information may lend itself to representation as a set of messageinstances, which may be atomic, and may be ordered and/or may naturallyoccur as a series. It should be appreciated that the information maychange over time and that any change in the information may naturally beassociated with a change in a particular message instance and/or achange in the set of message instances. A data feed or data stream mayinclude a set of messages. In an RSS environment, a message instance maybe referred to as an entry. In an OPML environment, the message instancemay be referred to as a list. More generally, a message may include anyelements of the syndication message definition noted above. Thus, itwill be appreciated that the terms “list,” “outline,” “message,” “item,”and the like may be used interchangeably in the description of enhancedsyndication systems herein. All such meanings are intended to fallwithin the scope of this disclosure unless a more specific meaning isexpressly indicated or clear from the context. A channel definition mayprovide metadata associated with a data feed, and a subscription requestmay include a URI or other metadata identifying a data feed and/or datafeed location. The location may without limitation comprise a networkaddress, indication of a network protocol, path, virtual path, filename,and any other suitable identifying information.

A syndication message definition may include any or all of the elementsof the following standards and drafts, all of which are herebyincorporated in their entirety by reference: RSS 2.0; Atom SyndicationFormat as presented in the IETF Internet-Draft Version 9 of the AtomSyndication Format; OPML 1.0; XML Signature Syntax (as published in theW3C Recommendation of 12 Feb. 2002); the XML Encryption Syntax (aspublished in the W3C Recommendation of 10 Dec. 2002); and the CommonMarkup for Micropayment per-fee-links (as published in the W3C WorkingDraft of 25 Aug. 1999). In summary, these elements, which are describedin detail in the above documents, may include the following: channel,title, link, description, language, copyright, managing editor(managingEditor), Web master (webmaster), publication date (pubDate),last build date (lastBuildDate), category, generator, documentation URL(docs), cloud, time to live (ttl), image, rating, text input(textInput), skip hours (skipHours), skip days (skipDays), item, author,comments, enclosure, globally unique identifier (guid), source, name,URI, email, feed, entry, content, contributor, generator, icon, id,logo, published, rights, source, subtitle, updated, opml, head, datecreated (dateCreated), date modified (dateModified), owner name(ownerName), owner e-mail (ownerEmail), expansion state(expansionState), vertical scroll state (vertScrollState), window top(windowTop), window left (windowLeft), window bottom (windowBottom),window right (windowRight), head, body, outline, signature (Signature),signature value (SignatureValue), signed information (SignedInfo),canonicalization method (CanonicalizationMethod), signature method(SignatureMethod), reference (Reference), transforms (Transforms),digest method (DigestMethod), digest value (DigestValue), keyinformation (KeyInfo), key value (KeyValue), DSA key value(DSAKeyvalue), RSA key value (RSAKeyValue), retrieval method(RetrievalMethod), X509 data (X509Data), PGP Data (PGPData), SPKI Data(SPKIData), management data (MgmtData), object (Object), manifest(Manifest), signature properties (SignatureProperties), encrypted type(EncryptedType), encryption method (EncryptionMethod), cipher data(CipherData), cipher reference (CipherReference), encrypted data(EncryptedData), encrypted key (EncryptedKey), reference list(ReferenceList), encryption properties (EncryptionProperties), price,text link (textlink), image link (imagelink), request URL (request URL),payment system (paymentsystem), buyer identification (buyerid), base URL(baseurl), long description (longdesc), merchant name (merchantname),duration, expiration, target, base language (hreflang), type, access key(accesskey), character set (charset), external metadata (ExtData), andexternal data parameter (ExtDataParm).

A syndication definition may also include elements pertaining to medicaldevices, crawlers, digital rights management, change logs, route traces,permanent links (also known as permalinks), time, video, devices, socialnetworking, vertical markets, downstream processing, and otheroperations associated with Internet-based syndication. The additionalelements may, without limitation, comprise the following: clinical note(ClinicalNote), biochemistry result (BiochemistryResult), DICOMcompliant MRI image (DCMRI), keywords (Keywords), license (License),change log (ChangeLog), route trace (RouteTrace), permalink (Permalink),time (Time), shopping cart (ShoppingCart), video (Video), device(Device), friend (Friend), market (Market), downstream processingdirective (DPDirective), set of associated files (FileSet), revisionhistory (RevisionHistory), revision (Revision), branch (Branch), merge(Merge), trunk (Trunk), and symbolic revision (SymbolicRevision).Generally, in embodiments, the names of the elements may be caseinsensitive.

For example, the contents of the clinical note element may withoutlimitation comprise a note written by a clinician, such as a referralletter from a primary care physician to a specialist. The contents ofthe biochemistry result element may without limitation comprise indiciaof total cholesterol, LDL cholesterol, HDL cholesterol, and/ortriglycerides. The contents of the DICOM compliant MRI image element maywithout limitation comprise an image file in the DICOM format. Thecontent of the keyword element may without limitation comprise a wordand/or phrase associated with the content contained in the message,wherein the word and/or phrase may be processed by a Web crawler. Thecontent of the license element may without limitation comprise a URLthat may refer to a Web page containing a description of a license underwhich the message is available. The content of the change log elementmay without limitation comprise a change log. The content of the routetrace element may without limitation comprise a list of the computersthrough which the message has passed, such as a list of “received:”headers analogous to those commonly appended to an e-mail message as ittravels from sender to receiver through one or more SMTP servers. Thecontent of the permalink element may without limitation comprise apermalink, such as an unchanging URL. The content of the time elementmay without limitation comprise a time, which may be representedaccording to RFC 868. The content of the shopping cart element maywithout limitation comprise a representation of a shopping cart, such asXML data that may comprise elements representative of quantity, item,item description, weight, and unit price. The content of the videoelement may without limitation comprise a MPEG-4 encoded video file. Thecontent of the device element may without limitation comprise a name ofa computing facility. The content of the friend element may withoutlimitation comprise a name of a friend associated with an author of anentry. The content of the market element may without limitation comprisea name of a market. The content of the downstream processing directiveelement may without limitation comprise a textual string representativeof a processing step, such as and without limitation “Archive This,”that ought to be carried out by a recipient of a message.

Thus, in general a syndication definition as that term is used hereindescribes a message format that enables Internet-syndication operations,as well as other complementary or separate operations. A message, asthat term is used herein, may be associated with a feature of RSS, maybe associated with a feature of Atom, may be associated with a featureof OPML, may be associated with a micropayment, may be associated withelectronic commerce, may be associated with a representation of medicalinformation, may be associated with the representation of publicinformation, may be associated with the representation of privateinformation, may be associated with the representation of protectedinformation, may be associated with a tag for a crawler, may beassociated with versioning and/or a change log, may be associated with adigital signature, may be associated with basic authentication, may beassociated with digest authentication, may associated with encryption,may be associated with a license term, may be associated with a routetrace, may be associated with a permalink, may be associated with anenclosure or file attachment, may be associated with an indication oftime or a timestamp, may be associated with e-commerce, may beassociated with searching, may be associated with filtering, may beassociated with clustering, may be associated with a database, may beassociated with security, may be associated with video, may beassociated with a device, may be associated with a user interface, maybe associated with a rule, may be associated with non-syndicationtechnologies, may be associated with social networking, may beassociated with a vertical market, may be associated with downstreamprocessing, may be associated with semantic processing, and/or may beassociated with a source.

A message as described herein may include, consist of, or be evaluatedby one or more rules or expressions (referred to collectively in thefollowing discussion as expressions) that provide descriptions of how amessage should be processed. In this context, the message may containdata in addition to expressions or may refer to an external source fordata. The expression may be asserted in a variety of syntaxes and may beexecutable and/or interpretable by a machine. For example, an expressionmay have a form such as that associated with the Lisp programminglanguage. Although an expression may commonly be represented as what maybe understood as a “Lisp-like expression” or “Lisp list”—for example, (a(b c))—this particular representation is not necessary. An expressionmay defined recursively and may include flow control, branching,conditional statements, loops, and any other aspects of structured,object oriented, aspect oriented, or other programming languages. Forexample and without limitation, it should be appreciated thatinformation encoded as SGML or any species thereof (such as and withoutlimitation, XML, HTML, OPML, RSS, and so forth) may easily berepresented as a Lisp-like expression and vice versa. Likewise, dataatoms, such as and without limitation a text string, a URL, a URI, afilename, and/or a pathname may naturally be represented as a Lisp-likeexpression and vice versa. Again, by way of illustration and notlimitation, any representation of encoded information that can bereduced to a Lisp-like expression may be an expression as that term isused herein.

An expression may, without limitation, express the following: a dataatom, a data structure, an algorithm, a style sheet, a specification, anentry, a list, an outline, a channel definition, a channel, an Internetfeed, a message, metadata, a URI, a URL, a subscription, a subscriptionrequest, a network address, an indication of a network protocol, a path,a virtual path, a filename, a syntax, a syntax defining an S-expression,a set, a relation, a function, a graph, a tree, a counting algorithm, aprobabilistic algorithm, a randomized algorithm, a geometricdistribution, a binomial distribution, a heap, a heapsort algorithm, apriority queue, a quicksort algorithm, a counting sort algorithm, aradix sort algorithm, a bucket sort algorithm, a median, an orderstatistic, a selection algorithm, a stack, a queue, a linked list, apointer, an object, a rooted tree, a hash table, a direct-address table,a hash function, an open addressing algorithm, a binary search tree, abinary search tree insertion algorithm, a binary search tree deletionalgorithm, a randomly built binary search tree, a red-black tree, ared-black tree rotation algorithm, a red-black tree insertion algorithm,a red-black tree deletion algorithm, a dynamic order statistic, aninterval tree, a dynamic programming algorithm, a matrix, a matrix-chainmultiplication algorithm, a longest common subsequence, a polygon, apolygon triangulation, an optimal polygon triangulation, an optionalpolygon triangulation algorithm, a greedy algorithm, a Huffman code, aHuffman coding algorithm, an amortized analysis algorithm, an aggregatemethod algorithm, an accounting method algorithm, a potential methodalgorithm, a dynamic table, a b-tree, a b-tree algorithm (such as andwithout limitation search, create, split, insert, nonfull, delete), abinomial heap, a binomial tree, a binomial heap algorithm (such as andwithout limitation create, minimum, link, union, insert, extractminimum, decrease key, delete), a Fibonacci heap, a mergeable heap, amergeable heap algorithm (such as and without limitation make heap,insert, minimum, extract minimum, and union), a disjoint set, a disjointset algorithm, a cyclic graph, an acyclic graph, a directed graph, anundirected graph, a sparse graph, a breadth-first search algorithm, adepth-first search algorithm, a topological sort algorithm, a minimumspanning tree, a Kruskal algorithm, a Prim algorithm, a single-sourceshortest path, Dijkstra's algorithm, a Bellman-Ford algorithm, anall-pairs shortest path, a matrix, a matrix multiplication algorithm,the Floyd-Warshall algorithm, Johnson's algorithm, a flow network, theFord-Fulkerson method, a maximum bipartite matching algorithm, apreflow-push algorithm, a lift-to-front algorithm, a sorting network, anarithmetic circuit, an algorithm for a parallel computer, a matrixoperation, a polynomial, a fast Fourier transform, a number-theoreticalgorithm, a string matching algorithm, a computational geometryalgorithm, an algorithm in complexity class P, an algorithm incomplexity class NP, and/or an approximation algorithm.

In one aspect, a message processor as described herein may include ahardware and/or software platform for evaluating messages according toany of the expressions described above. The message processor mayreside, for example, on the server computer or client computer asdescribed above. The processing may without limitation include the stepsof read, evaluate, execute, interpret, apply, store, and/or print. Themachine for processing an expression may comprise software and/orhardware. The machine may be designed to process a particularrepresentation of an expression, such as and without limitation SGML orany species thereof. Alternatively, the machine may be a metacircularevaluator capable of processing any arbitrary representation of anS-expression as specified in a representation of an expression.

Generally, a message may include or be an expression. In otherembodiments, the expression evaluation process may itself be syndicated.In such an embodiment, interpretations (i.e., evaluations) of a messagemay vary according to a particular evaluation expression, even where theunderlying message remains constant, such as by filtering,concatenating, supplementing, sorting, or otherwise processing elementsof the message or a plurality of messages. Different evaluationexpressions may be made available as syndicated content using thesyndication techniques described generally herein.

The message may specify presentation (e.g., display) parameters, orinclude expressions or other elements characterizing a conversion intoone or more presentation formats.

In embodiments, the message may include an OPML file with an outline ofcontent, such as and without limitation a table of contents; an index; asubject and associated talking points, wherein the talking points may ormay not be bulleted; an image; a flowchart; a spreadsheet; a chart; adiagram; a figure; or any combination thereof. A conversion facility,which may include any of the clients or servers described above, mayreceive the message and convert it to a specified presentation format,which may include any proprietary or open format suitable forpresentation. This may include without limitation a Microsoft PowerPointfile, a Microsoft Word file, a PDF file, an HTML file, a rich text file,or any other file comprising both a representation of content and arepresentation of a presentation of the content. The representation ofcontent may comprise a sequence of text, an image, a movie clip, anaudio clip, or any other embodiment of content. The representation ofthe presentation of the content may include characteristics such as afont, a font size, a style, an emphasis, a de-emphasis, a page-relativeposition, a screen-relative position, an abstract position, anorientation, a scale, a font color, a background color, a foregroundcolor, an indication of opacity, a skin, a style, a look and feel, orany other embodiment of presentation, as well as combinations of any orall of the foregoing. In a corresponding method, a message may bereceived and processed, and a corresponding output file may be created,that represents a presentation format of the received message. Invarious aspects, the message may include an OPML file with references toexternal data. During processing, this data may be located andadditionally processed as necessary or desired for incorporation intothe output file.

In one embodiment, the system may include an OPML to PowerPointconverter that traverses one or more OPML outlines and converts the OPMLoutline into a Microsoft PowerPoint presentation having a structurerepresentative of the structure embodied in the outline. This mayinclude, for example, one or more introductory slides with title,author, creation date, and other information. This may also include oneor more slides summarizing the contents of the entire PowerPointdocument based upon the top level contents of the outline in the OPMLdocument. Sub-categories may be similarly previewed in the PowerPointdocument with slides that list all elements of an outline at onehierarchical level, followed by a number of slides addressing eachelement in greater detail. Additionally, items such as graphics, charts,tables, audio clips, word documents, and the like that are contained onleaf nodes of the OPML outline may be rendered within the PowerPointslides to capture some or all of the multi-media content representedwithin the OPML outline. Similarly, the system may convert a PowerPointpresentation into an OPML outline and may either employ the explicitlyoutlined structure of the PowerPoint presentation or infer structurefrom the arrangement or titles of slides within the PowerPoint document.

FIG. 7 shows a user interface 700 for data feed management. Moreparticularly, FIG. 7 depicts a manage filters page in which a user cancreate, edit, and share filters. The page may include navigation buttonsand a “What's Hot” and a “News They Like” workspace. In addition, thepage may provide a list of available filters. New filters may becreated, and rules for each filter may be defined using, for example,Boolean or other operators on defined fields for data feeds or on fulltext of items within data fields. In order to promote communityactivity, each filter may be made public for others to use, and therules and other structure of each filter may also be optionally sharedfor others to inspect. As a significant advantage over existing systems,these filters may be applied in real time to RSS data feeds or otherdata feeds to narrow the universe of items that is displayed to a user.

In one aspect, the systems described herein may be used to scanhistorical feed data and locate relevant data feeds. For example,filters may be applied to historical feed data to identify feeds ofinterest to a user. For example, by searching for words such as“optical” and “surgery” in a universe of medical feeds, a user maylocate feeds relevant to optical laser surgery regardless of how thosefeeds are labeled or characterized by other users or content providers.In another complementary application, numerous filters may be testedagainst known relevant feeds, with a filter selected according to theresults. This process may be iterative, where a user may design afilter, test it against relevant feeds, apply to other feeds to locatenew relevant feeds, and repeat. Thus, while real-time or near real timefiltering is one aspect of the systems described herein, the filteringtechnology may be used with historical data to improve the yield ofrelevant material for virtually any topic of interest.

Another advantage of filtering historical data is the ability to capturetransient discussions and topics that are not currently of interest.Thus, a user interested in the 1996 U.S. Presidential campaign may findlittle relevant material on current data feeds but may find a highamount of relevant data in the time period immediately preceding thesubsequent 2000 campaign. Similarly, an arbitrary topic such as Egyptianhistory may have been widely discussed at some time in the past, whilereceiving very little attention today. The application of filters tohistorical feeds may provide search functionality similar to structuredsearching of static Web content. Thus there is disclosed herein a timeor chronology oriented search tool for searching the contents of one ormore sequential data feeds.

In another aspect, the filters may be applied to a wide array of feeds,such as news sources, to build a real-time magazine dedicated to aparticular topic. The results may be further parsed into categories bysource. For example, for diabetes related filters, the results may beparsed into groups such as medical and research journals, patientcommentaries, medical practitioner Weblogs, and so forth. The resultingaggregated data feed may also be combined with a readers' forum,editor's overview, highlights of current developments, and so forth,each of which may be an additional data feed for use, for example, in aWeb-based, real-time, magazine or a new aggregated data feed.

In general, the filter may apply any known rules for discriminating textor other media to identified data feeds. For example, rules may beprovided for determining the presence or absence of any word or groupsof words. Wild card characters and word stems may also be used infilters. In addition, if-then rules or other logical collections ofrules may be used. Proximity may be used in filters, where the number ofwords between two related words is factored into the filtering process.Weighting may be applied so that certain words, groups of words, orfilter rules are applied with different weight toward the ultimatedetermination of whether to filter a particular item. Externalreferences from an item, e.g., links to other external content (eitherthe existence of links, or the domain or other aspects thereof) may beused to filter incoming items of a data feed. External links to a datafeed or data item may also be used, so as to determine relevance bylooking at the number of users who have linked to an item. This processmay be expanded to measure the relevance of each link by examining thenumber of additional links produced by the linking entity. In otherwords, if someone links to a reference and that user has no other links,this may be less relevant than someone who links to the reference andhas one hundred other links. This type of linking analysis system isprovided, for example, by Technorati.

Filters may apply semantic analysis to determine or approximate thetone, content, or other aspects of an item by analyzing words and wordpatterns therein. Filters may also examine the source of an item, suchas whether it is from a .com top-level domain or an .edu top-leveldomain. The significance of a source designation as either increasing ordecreasing the likelihood of passing through the filter may, of course,depend on the type of filter. Additionally, synonyms for search terms orcriteria may be automatically generated and applied alongside userspecified filter criteria.

Metadata may be used to measure relevance. Data feeds and data items maybe tagged with either subject matter codes or descriptive words andphrases to indicate content. Tags may be provided by an external trustedauthority, such as an editorial board, or provided by an author of eachitem or provider of each data feed. These and any other rules capable ofexpression through a user interface may be applied to items or posts indata feeds to locate content of interest to a particular user.

As noted above, a user may also share data feeds, aggregated data feeds,and/or filters with others. Thus, in general, there is provided herein areal-time data mining method for use with data feeds such as RSS feeds.Through the intelligent filtering enabled by this data feed managementsystem, automatically updating information montages tailored to specifictopics or users may be created that include any number of differentperspectives from one to one hundred to one thousand or more. Thesereal-time montages may be adapted to any number of distinct customersegments of any size, as well as to business vertical marketapplications.

In another aspect, filters may provide a gating technology forsubsequent action. For example, when a number of items are identifiedmeeting a particular filter criterion, specific, automated actions maybe taken in response. For example, filter results, or some predeterminednumber of filter results, may trigger a responsive action such asdisplaying an alert on a user's monitor, posting the results on aWeblog, e-mailing the results to others, tagging the results withcertain metadata, or signaling for user intervention to review theresults and status. Thus, for example, when a filter produces fourresults, an e-mail containing the results may be transmitted to a userwith embedded links to the source material.

FIG. 8 shows a user interface 800 for data feed management. Moreparticularly, FIG. 8 depicts a search feeds page in which a user cansearch for additional data feeds to monitor. The page may includenavigation buttons and a “What's Hot” and a “News They Like” workspace.In addition, the page may include a text input field for user input ofone or more search terms. There may also be one or more checkboxes orother controls for additional search parameters. For example, a user mayselect whether to search titles only, other information in thedescription of the feed, or individual items or postings in the feed.The search itself may also be stored, so that new searches for the samesubject matter optionally will not include feeds that a user has alreadyreviewed and rejected. Alternatively, the search may be persistent, sothat the request search continues to execute against a database of feedsand posts as new feeds and new posts are added. Thus a user may leavethe search and return to the search at a later time to review changes inresults. The results for a search may be presented in the user interfacealong with a number of user controls for appropriately placing the feedwithin the user's feed environment. For example, a user may provide anew, user-assigned category to a feed or select from one or more of theuser's pre-existing categories. The user may also specify one or morefilters, either pre-built or custom-built by the user, to apply to itemsin the data feed once it is added. After a feed has been added, the usermay review items passing through the assigned filter, if any, in thehome page discussed above.

It will be appreciated that search results will be improved by theavailability of well organized databases. While a number of Weblogsprovide local search functionality, and a number of aggregator servicesprovide lists of available data feeds, there does not presently exist aconsumer-level searchable database of feed contents, at least nothingequivalent to what Google or Altavista provide for the Web. As such, oneaspect of the system described herein is a database of data feeds thatis searchable by contents as well as metadata such as title anddescription. In a server used with the systems described herein, theentire universe of known data feeds may be hashed or otherwise organizedinto searchable form in real time or near real time. The hash index mayinclude each word or other symbol and any data necessary to locate it ina stream and in a post.

One useful parameter that may be included for searching is age. That is,the age of a feed, the age of posts within a feed, and any otherfrequency data may be integrated into the database for use in structureduser searches (and the filters discussed in reference to FIG. 7).

As a further advantage, data may be retrieved from other aggregators anddata feeds on a well-defined schedule. In addition to providing a verycurrent view of data streams, this approach prevents certaininconsistencies that occur with currently used aggregators. For example,even for aggregator sites that push notification of updates tosubscribers, there may be inconsistencies between source data and datafeed data if the source data is modified. While it is possible to renewnotification when source material is updated, this is not universallyimplemented in aggregators or Weblog software commonly employed by endusers. Thus an aggregator may extract data from another aggregator thathas not been updated. At the same time, an aggregator or data source mayprevent repeated access from the same location (e.g., IP address). Byaccessing all of this data on a regular schedule (that is acceptable tothe respective data sources and aggregators) and storing the resultslocally, the server described herein may maintain a current and accurateview of data feeds. Additionally, feeds may be automatically added bysearching and monitoring in real time, in a manner analogous to Web botsused by search engines for static content.

In another aspect, a method of selling data feed services is disclosedherein. In this method, RSS data which is actually static content infiles may be serialized for distribution according to some time base ortime standard such as one item every sixty seconds or every fiveminutes. In addition, data may be filtered to select one item of highestpriority at each transmission interval. In another configuration, oneupdate of all items may be pushed to subscribers every hour or on someother schedule in an effective batch mode. Optionally, a protocol may beestablished between the server and clients that provides real timenotification of new items. A revenue model may be constructed around theserialized data in which users pay increasing subscription rates forincreasing timeliness, with premium subscribers receiving nearlyinstantaneous updates. Thus in one aspect, a data feed system ismodified to provide time-based data feeds to end users. This may beparticularly useful for time sensitive information such as sports scoresor stock prices. In another embodiment, the end-user feed may adhere toan RSS or other data feed standard but nonetheless use a tightlycontrolled feed schedule that is known to both the source and recipientof the data to create a virtual time based data feed.

FIG. 9 shows a user interface 900 for data feed management. Moreparticularly, FIG. 9 depicts a user profile page in which a user cansearch for additional data feeds to monitor. The page may includenavigation buttons and a “What's Hot” and a “News They Like” workspaces.In addition, the page may include text entry boxes, check boxes, andother controls, along with a save button for saving profile data. Textentry items may include, for example, a first name, last name, e-mailaddress, password (and retype password), and a default maximum age offeeds (e.g., in hours) and a default minimum and/or maximum number ofposts per feed for controlling a user display thereof, such as in thehome page. Checkboxes may provide for selection of certain features. Forexample, a user may choose to have post descriptions displayed, a usermay make his home page or features thereof public, a user may choose touse common categories provided by the system, and a user may chooseamong one or more pre-defined or user configured display modes forfeeds.

Additional profile information, such as user interests, preferences, andbiographical data may also be optionally provided. This data and otheruser profile data may be used to target advertising associated with datafeed sites or content. Thus a data feed management system is describedherein in which ads are delivered that are of value to customers. Inaddition to self-signaling through profile data, the system may applycustomer-filtering, behavioral analysis, or any other analytic tools, asapplied to the user's feed selection and displayed posts, to selectappropriate advertisements for that user. The revenues fromadvertisements may be shared in a number of ways and may include sharesof revenue to, for example, the operator of the data feed managementsystem, an intermediary that places an ad that results in a sale, and/orindividual or institutional content providers who contributed to therelevant data feed audience.

In another aspect of the systems described herein, feeds, posts, and/orfilters may be clustered and shared in a number of ways as describedabove. Particular configurations may be branded and sold as avalue-added service. Thus, for example, Warren Buffet's data feedselection and filtering may be of great interest to investors, bankers,and financiers. These selections may be sold to users who wish to seedata feeds in the same manner as Warren Buffet. Similarly, someone maybe interested in the writings and readings of Martha Stewart, BillClinton, Bill O'Reilly, Bill Gates, or Bill Belichick. Any of theseindividuals may brand and resell their selection of data feeds anddesign and use of filters. Similarly, commercial, political, or otherinstitutional entities may present an official RSS feed identity. Thismay be provided for free for promotional purposes, such as promotion ofa political party in a campaign or promotion of a seasonal sale event bya retailer. Similarly, topical selections may be promoted by tradegroups or individuals. For example, a biotech or patent filter may bepromoted by a patent law firm. In these applications, the service soldor promoted may include either the filters and selections themselves,which an end user may then modify or use as desired, or an aggregatedfeed of results from the filters and selections without identificationof the underlying criteria. Access to such an aggregated feed may becontrolled through password based protection to a resulting Weblog orusing the identity-based RSS technology described above.

In one embodiment, a user may, either for a fee as described above, orfor free, such as among a group of friends or interest-based communityof bloggers, share not just search results but rules for finding thosesearch results. In another application of this technology, a buddy listor other community may share aggregator configurations and other data.In another application of this, a recommendation engine may identifypopular and successful search and filtering criteria that match aparticular use profile.

In one aspect, there is described herein a systematic approach tomanaging data feeds in an integrated, and possibly Web-based, userinterface. In a first step, the user may process feeds, including forexample searching for, analyzing and selecting feeds. In a second step,a user may process posts within a feed, such as by filtering the postsas described above. In a third step, the aggregated and filtered resultsmay be displayed to the user. This systematic approach also readilyaccommodates subsequent processing of the resulting items, such as bybranding the technique for locating those items or by permitting sharingof the technique, both of which are described above. Additionalprocessing steps may also include, for example, aggregating results intoan aggregated feed or any of the other processing steps identified inthe foregoing detailed description.

A number of enhanced syndication systems providing security are nowdescribed in greater detail. While a number of examples of RSS areprovided as embodiments of a secure syndication system, it will beappreciated that RDF, Atom, or any other syndication language, or OPMLor other structured grammar, including more generally the S-definitionset out above, may be advantageously employed within a securesyndication framework as set forth herein.

Security may impact a number of features of a syndication system. Forexample, a data stream system may use identity assignment and/orencryption and/or identity authentication and/or decryption by publicand private encryption keys for RSS items and similar structured datasets and data streams. The system may include notification of deliveryas well as interpretation of delivery success, failure, notification ofpossible compromise of the end-to-end security system, non-repudiation,and so on. The identity assignment and encryption as well as theauthentication and decryption as well as the notification andinterpretation may occur at any or multiple points in the electroniccommunication process, some of which are illustrated and describedbelow. A secure RSS system may be advantageously employed in a number ofareas including, but not limited to, general business, health care, andfinancial services. Encryption may be employed in a number of wayswithin an RSS system, including encryption and/or authentication of theprimary message, notification to a sender or third party of receipt ofmessages, interpretation of delivery method, and processing of an RSSitem during delivery.

In item-level encryption of the primary message, an item from an RSSsource or similar source may be assigned an identifier (which may besecure, such as a digital signature) and/or encrypted with a key (suchas a private key in a Public Key Infrastructure (PKI)) and transmittedto a recipient, who may use a corresponding public key associated with aparticular source to authenticate or decrypt the communication. A publickey may be sent to the recipient simultaneously or in advance by a thirdparty or collected by the recipient from a third-party source such as apublic network location provided by the source or a trusted third party.In other embodiments, an intended recipient may provide a public key toa sender, so that the sender (which may be a content source, aggregator,or other RSS participant) may encrypt data in a manner that may only bedecrypted by the intended recipient. In this type of exchange, theintended recipient's public key may similarly be published to a publicweb location, e-mailed directly from the recipient, or provided by atrusted third party.

In tag-level encryption of fields of data delimited within a message,similar encryption techniques may be employed. By using tag-levelencryption, security may be controlled for specific elements of amessage and may vary from field to field within a single message.Tag-level encryption may be usefully employed, for example, within amedical records context. In a medical environment (and in numerous otherenvironments), it may be appropriate to treat different components of,e.g., a medical record, in different ways. Thus, while a medical recordof an event may include information from numerous sources, it may beuseful to compose the medical record from various atomic data types,each having unique security and other characteristics associated withits source. Thus, the medical record may include treatment objects,device objects, radiology objects, people objects, billing objects,insurance objects, diagnosis objects, and so forth. Each object maycarry its own encryption keys and/or security features so that theentire medical record may be composed and distributed without regard tosecurity for individual elements.

In a notification system, a secondary or meta return message may betriggered by receipt, authentication, and/or decryption of the primarymessage by a recipient and sent by the recipient to the messageoriginator, or to a third party, to provide reliable notification ofreceipt.

In interpretation of delivery information, a sender or trustedintermediary may monitor the return message(s) and compare these with alist of expected return messages (based for example on the list ofpreviously or recently sent messages). This comparison information maybe interpreted to provide information as to whether a communication wassuccessful and, in the case of communication to more than one recipient,to determine how many and what percentage of communications weresuccessful. The receipt of return messages that do not match the list ofexpected messages may be used to determine that fraudulent messages arebeing sent to recipients, perhaps using a duplicate of an authenticprivate key, and that the security service may have been compromised.

In another aspect, a series of encryption keys may be used by the sourceand various aggregators or other intermediaries in order to trackdistribution of items through an RSS network. This tracking may eitheruse notification and interpretation as described herein or may simplyreside in the finally distributed item, which will require a specificorder of keys to properly decrypt some or all of the item. If thissystem is being used primarily for tracking, rather than security,encryption and decryption information may be embedded directly into theRSS item, either in one of the current fields or in a new field forcarrying distribution channel information (e.g., <DISTRIBUTION> . . .</DISTRIBUTION>.

In another aspect, the message may be processed at any point duringdistribution. For example, the communication process may include manystages of processing from the initial generation of a message throughits ultimate receipt. Any two or more stages may be engaged in identityassignment and/or encryption as well as the authentication and/ordecryption as well as notification and/or interpretation. These stagesmay include but are not limited to message generation software such asword-processors or blog software, message conversion software forproducing an RSS version of a message and putting it into a file open tothe Internet, relay by a messaging service such as one that might hostmessage generation and RSS conversion software for many producers, relayby a proxy server or other caching server, relay by a notificationserver whose major function is notifying potential recipients to “pull”a message from a source, and services for message receiving andaggregating and filtering multiple messages, message display torecipients, and message forwarding to further recipients.

In another aspect, a message may include one or more digital signatures,which may be authenticated with reference to, for example, the messagecontents, or a hash or other digest thereof, in combination with apublic key for the purported author. Conversely, a recipient of adigitally signed item may verify authenticity with reference to themessage contents, or a hash or other digest version thereof, incombination with a private key of the recipient.

FIG. 11 shows a data pool environment. The environment 1000 may includea number of users 1002 in a user community 1004, a network 1006 such asthe internetwork described above, a number of pools 1010 of data, and apool management infrastructure 1012.

In general, the pools 1010 may be physically deployed on any datastorage resource accessible through the network 1006. This may include,for example, a database, web server, FTP file, peer-to-peer file sharingresource, secure database, RSS channel, or any other technology platformand system(s) suitable for receiving, storing, and transmitting data. Itwill be understood that, in various embodiments, each pool may be alogically and/or physically separate storage location, permitting eitherdistributed management of common data (e.g., for purposes of security,redundancy, or the like) or centralization of distributed data (e.g.,for more efficient processing).

While a pool may be realized as, for example, a conventional RSS channelthat receives and publishes items, other pools may collect and presentdata in more complex ways. For example, the pool managementinfrastructure 1012 may include a pool server or other system thateither physically or logically sits between the user community 1004 andthe pools 1010 and brokers interactions. The infrastructure 1012 maycontrol access to the pools through a security system that includes, forexample, any of the security features or systems described herein. Inone embodiment, the infrastructure 1012 may include a firewall, router,switch, or similar device that physically resides between the pools 1010and the user community 1004. The pools 1010 may also, or instead, bepartially or completely encrypted. The infrastructure 1012 may alsoprovide attention management by tracking user interactions with variouspools and/or data within pools. In one aspect, the infrastructure 1012may provide anonymity either to users 1002 accessing the pools 1010, orto the pools 1010 or sources of data therein. In another aspect, theinfrastructure 1012 may provide formatting functions. As with anonymity,formatting may operate in either direction, i.e., by formatting userrequests in a manner suitable for presentation to the pools (or thatcreates a logical appearance of pools to differently structuredunderlying data sources) or by formatting any responsive output from apool. In one aspect, the infrastructure may provide a dynamic contentsystem that provides different views of pools according to a user type,user identity, or the like. In another aspect, the infrastructure 1012may provide search capabilities including structured searching and/orspidering for content within the pools 1010. It will be understood that,while depicted as a single, centralized server, the pool managementinfrastructure 1012 may include any number of servers and/or othernetwork devices or systems that cooperate and/or operate autonomously tocreate a data pool environment for users 1002 in a community 1004.

The community 1004 may include any user or group of users 1002 thataccess data in pools 1012 either by providing data to the pools,extracting data from the pools, or both. This may include social groups,professional groups, commercial entities, and so forth.

Using a pool management infrastructure 1012, sources of data may betreated as populations and managed as an integrated but evolving ecologyor topology, so that new forms of data can be added to the ecologycontinually, so that sets of data in particular forms can be added toand/or modified, and so that uses of data and combinations of data canbe continually invented and implemented within the ecology withoutreworking the existing structure and applications.

In one example, the pool management infrastructure 1012 may enablesecure management of a pool system and any associated data, data formatsand pool enclosures. The infrastructure may, for example, provide anadministrative dashboard that includes an administrative interface to asecure access control system, an administrative interface to a CommonVulnerabilities and Exposures system, and an administrative interface tothe update notification, availability, and spider system (provided byvendor). The infrastructure 1012 may also, or instead, include anadministrative interface for configuring the data converter and routersystems to put data into pools, controls for a spider to controlextraction, and search/filter/cluster and routing to pools and webservices. It may also include interfaces for directing web services totake input directly from particular pools, to take input from the spiderand other routing machines, and to output service results to particularpools and services in particular formats.

The pool data storage format may be XML, RSS, OPML, Atom, RDF or anyother data format. Pool content may be managed using a file directorysystem maintained by an operating system such as Linux, Unix, andMicrosoft Windows. Pool content, including enclosures to pool items, maybe provided by a client-side central data store for XML, RSS, andrelated formats included in the Microsoft Vista operating system forpersonal computers.

Sources of data for pools may include any source(s) of digital data. Forexample, in a medical context, sources may include machines such asx-ray, MRE, PET, CT, and other medical imaging devices, as well as blooddiagnostic, inventory management, ordering, scheduling, billing, humanoutput-fed programs such as notes on medical record diagnostic forms,and/or process-fed outputs such as the result of a cross-functionalmedical second opinion process. In an enterprise, suitable sources mayinclude document management systems, electronic mail systems, instantmessaging systems, billing systems, accounting systems, human resourcessystems, computer/network traffic management systems, and so forth.

These sources may also or instead output data to the data pools in acommon format such as XML, RSS, OPML, Atom, RDF, or any other commonformat. Data sources may also send their customary outputs through aformat converter that outputs a common format and a data pool routerthat directs the output to an appropriate data pool or pools.

In one aspect, data pools may be viewed as folders open to inspectionor, more formally, reading and writing by a spider or other searchmechanism. A spider may, for example, use remote web service calls topoll each pool (or a pool interface provided by the pool managementinfrastructure) to determine if a given pool is accessible or if it hashad any changes to its contents, and to read and write pool content. Aspider may be deployed to monitor and manage a total topology of poolsand any data contained therein.

Spiders may collect information from pools and enable the sharedmanagement of information across pools by allowing diverse informationto be retrieved, assembled, and analyzed in order to, for example,create a virtual medical record by combining data elements that are heldin different pools of diagnostic test results, physician notes, and theresults of processes. Pools also may be accessed for quality control,for example to review x-ray's and diagnostic findings for a randomsample of patients, in order to ascertain the quality of diagnosis.

Pools may employ a variety of security measures to achieve conditionalaccess, privacy, security, and the like. Access to pools can becontrolled for individuals (e.g., according to identity or role),spiders, web services, and so forth. Access control may be implemented,for example, using third party products such as Cisco Secure AccessServer or Microsoft Products such as Windows Active Directory or theWindows Server Network Access Protection (NAP) policy enforcementplatform built into the Microsoft Windows Vista and Windows Serveroperating systems.

CVE, or Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures, analysis and remediationis a process through which network assets are analyzed to determinevulnerability to hacking, data theft, unauthorized access and the like.The US government, in cooperation with The MITRE Corporation (“MITRE”)and computer software and hardware vendors, monitors and inventoriesvulnerabilities and exposures. A number of companies provide software,hardware, and consulting services to identify and address these risks ona network such as an enterprise or corporate network. In an enterprisepool management system, CVE may be applied to data pools and anysupporting infrastructure. Pools using conditional access and securitysystems such as those that assure compliance with HIPPA health dataprotection standards may be assessed using CVE techniques. In additionto identifying common vulnerabilities and threats, a security system mayaccommodate automated or semi-automated interventions to secure datapools and infrastructure. In one embodiment, CVE-enabled security forpools may be provided with suitable adaptations to commerciallyavailable products and services, such as the NetClarity AuditorEnterprise system.

In general syndicated data, outlined data, or, more generally, anystructured or unstructured data may be stored in “pools”, which providesa useful conceptual model for interaction with syndicated content andother data, as well as a specific term to refer to data sources and/orrepositories that interact with the systems described herein. Aspects ofthe present invention relate to pooling syndicated information. Poolsmay contain information relating to information that was found in datastreams. A pool may represent, for example, information from one or moredata streams at particular times or from particular sources. Forexample, a financial market may produce a stream of data relating totrades made during a trading session, and a pool of data extracted fromthe stream may be created for subsequent use. As another example,medical information may be produced by a medical device, and the medicaldevice information may be pushed into a data stream. The medicalinformation from the data stream may be extracted from the stream andplaced in a pool. As another example, all information related to aparticular topic, person, entity, or the like may be acquired from arange of different data streams and placed into a corresponding pool.

Pools of data can be merged with other pools of data to form largerpools (e.g. to combine things of like file type, semantic meaning,subject matter, etc.). In embodiments, pools may be drained, and indoing so new data streams may be created. An example would be streaminga series of offers to sell goods (or services, securities, etc.) at agiven price, out of a pool of such offers. In embodiments, the datastream may be buffered until relevant decision points are achieved.

In embodiments, a filter may be associated with a pool of data. A poolof data may be created from unfiltered data (e.g. an unfiltered datastream), and then over time the pool can be run through filters toproduce a cleaner/more relevant pool of data. The filter could be asemantic filter, a collaborative filter, a logical filter, or a humanfilter (such as a community that validates the presence of content inthe pool). E.g., a pool could contain “good movies” that are monitoredby a community.

In embodiments, pools may be linked to other pools, so that one poolspills into the other (e.g., a pool of data that takes input fromanother pool upon occurrence of an event, such as availability of aresource for processing, for example, when a resource becomes availableto process an incoming message requesting help from a software help deskand is handed into a pool of similar requests for handling by someonewho is responsible for that type of request). Pools of data canevaporate (that is, data items can be made to expire from the pool),either based on age or based on the right conditions (e.g., if a priceof a security drops low enough, then limit orders may be triggered; iftime passes, an option can expire, etc.). Pools may be filled bydifferent sources (a main source, as well as secondary sources orstreams that augment the main source streams).

An aspect of the systems described herein relates to the filtering ofcontents such as syndicated feeds and the like. Syndication contentfilters may be used in connection with hardware, software, firmware, ina chip set or in another configuration. In embodiments, a user maypublish or subscribe to a syndication feed on his desktop system ormobile communication facility (e.g. PDA, cellular phone and the like),and the syndication feed may be filtered through a syndication filter.In embodiments, the syndication filter is a mechanism adapted to definethe syndication feed. For example, a device may be set to collectcertain feeds through a hardware enabled syndication filter.

FIG. 11A illustrates a filter 1104 implemented in a hardware application1100. The filter 1104 may be, for example, a syndication filter thatoperates on syndicated content such as data feeds. A router 1110 may beadapted to receive network information through a network connection1102. The network connection 1102 may provide data received from anetwork, either directly or indirectly, to the filter 1104. The filter1104 may be implemented through software, hardware, firmware, or otherconfigurations, or some combination of these. The filter 1104 may beadapted to analyze network information received or transmitted throughthe network connection 1102 and perform filtering, direction, routing,or other manipulation of the data. For example, the syndication filtermay analyze the data from the network connection and determine thatcertain data are related to a data feed that is not permitted (e.g. itmay be a feed known for containing a virus, spyware, malware, or otherundesirable content), and the non-permitted data may be extracted,removed, deleted, erased, logged, directed to a file, or otherwisemanipulated. Information that is received on the network connection 1102that is not determined as data requiring filtering may be passed to aport management facility 1108 in the router 1110. The port managementfacility 1108 may pass information to client A 1112A or client B 1112Bbased on an IP address or any other source or destination address, orother information.

FIG. 11B illustrates a client facility 1132 with a hardware syndicationfilter 1124 and a software syndication filter 1130. The client facility1132 may receive network information through a network connection 1102.The network information or data may be received by a network card 1122(e.g. an Ethernet card, a Network Interface Card, or othercommunications interface) or the like. The network card 1122 may beassociated with a syndication filter hardware facility 1124. Thesyndication hardware facility 1124 may perform functions similar tothose described in connection with the filter 1104 of FIG. 11A, forexample. The syndication filter hardware facility 1124 may performfiltering functions autonomously or in connection with another facility(e.g. software syndication filter facility 1130). The hardwaresyndication filter 1124 may operate in connection with dedicatedhardware, software, and/or firmware. In embodiments, the hardwaresyndication filter 1124 is adapted to filter content in syndicationfeeds and the like. For example, the client device 1132 may be set toreceive a syndication feed, and the feed may be received on the networkconnection 1102. The feed may include a virus, malware, spyware, orother undesired content, and the syndication filter hardware 1124 maystrip or otherwise manipulate the undesired content from the syndicationfeed. The remaining portions of the syndication feed may be passed toother client hardware such as a central processing unit (“CPU”) 1128. Inembodiments, associated feed data such as enclosures, attachments, andthe like may also be processed by the hardware syndication filter 1124.

The client 1132 may also or instead include a software based syndicationfilter 1130. The software syndication filter 1130 may execute as abackground process associated with network traffic or be integrated intoan operating system or an application executing on the CPU 1128, and itmay run from volatile or non-volatile memory (not shown) associated withthe client 1132. The software syndication filter 1130 may provide, forexample, the functions of the hardware syndication filter 1124 orsyndication filter 1104 described above. The CPU 1128 may call asoftware syndication filter routine from the data repository in theprocess of monitoring a syndication feed. For example, in the process ofreceiving a syndication feed, the CPU may call the routine to monitor,analyze, manipulate, or otherwise interact with the feed.

FIG. 12 illustrates a method for filtering syndicated data 1200. Themethod may involve receiving a syndicated information feed 1202,analyzing the feed 1204, and applying criteria 1208 to the feed todetermine a filtering action. The analysis may be accomplished throughhardware, software, firmware, or other solution (e.g. as described inconnection with FIGS. 11A, 11B and 12). The analysis may be rule-based,look-up based, heuristic, algorithmic, semantic, or may employ any othersuitable techniques for analyzing content. The criteria 1208 may also beapplied through a hardware solution, a software solution, a firmwaresolution, or any other technique, or any combination of these. Thecriteria applied to the analysis may be algorithm-based, table-based, orit may use other criteria for determining whether the content should befiltered. For example, a table of known viruses may be used in a processof matching information extracted from the feed to determine if thefeed, or portions thereof, includes known viruses, virus parameters, orindications of a virus. The filter may apply rules or the like basedupon, e.g., content, source, destination, semantic content, usercriteria, and so forth. Following the application of a criterion 1208,the content may be filtered (e.g. deleted) and/or redirected (e.g.placed in a folder adapted to hold filtered content for later review,deletion, and/or manipulation) 1212, or the content may be passed on forfurther processing, such as formatting and presentation to a userthrough a client.

Filters may operate on various data types within syndicated messages.Syndicated data feeds (e.g. RSS or syndicated OPML) may contain deviceconfiguration settings, images, video, data, broadcast ratinginformation, and the like. Syndicated feeds may be available in orcontain many different formats (e.g. tables, databases, documents,multimedia, web content formats, metadata, electronic mail, and soforth), and they may contain information from a variety of sources suchas electronic mail, online content, or web content. A feed may containvarious types of information for signal type filters such as radio andTV broadcast content/rating, security information, and the like. Thefeed, or messages within a feed, may include data for suitably enableddevices to change a mode of operation, using different modes to suitdifferent content, client devices, and so forth. In an organization,users on different IP addresses may desire different information contentfrom the same source; a hardware device may have a syndication filterincorporated to automatically filter and/or sort the syndicated data tothe proper IP address(es). Syndication applications may be capable ofautomatically performing an analysis on received feeds to filter IP/URLaddresses, viruses, attached files in email, weblog feeds, email/instantmessages, web content, phone calls, TV channels, or various analog anddigital signals. A filter may apply different rules to different typesof enclosures or attachments. Thus, for example, a filter may apply afirst set of rules to MP3 attachments, a second set of rules to OPMLattachments, a third set of rules to metadata, and a fourth set of rulesto textual content within a message.

In general, a filter may operate to pass certain information and/orblock certain information. In a data feed environment, filters mayemploy a variety of techniques to filter a feed. The filter may operateon various aspects of the feed. This may include, for example, textualcontent, metadata, attachments, external references (either from an itemor to an item), and so forth. A filter may employ rules, algorithms,look-up tables, keywords, Boolean expressions, heuristics, and the like.A filter may operate on specific fields within an item, such as source,name, date, title, and so forth. Numerous devices may incorporatesyndication filtering as described generally above. A number ofnon-limiting examples are provided below. Some of these examples show adevice that implements filtering of syndicated content. Other examplesshow conventional filters that send or receive filter-related data in asyndicated format. Various combinations and modifications of theexamples and these general principles will be apparent to one ofordinary skill in the art and are intended to fall within the scope ofthis disclosure.

Filtering may be embedded into a network router. Network routers mayhave syndication filter capability incorporated into the network routerfirmware or may have a syndication-capable chip or chip set incorporatedinto at least one of the network router processors or circuit boards.The syndication-capable network router may be able to recognize that areceived file is a syndication data feed and may make routing decisionsbased on the syndication data feed contents. The syndication-capablenetwork router may be able to route data to IP addresses on a networkbased on the syndication data or information contained in the header andbody of a network packet or by information in the syndication feed. Thesyndication feeds may originate from IP addresses within the routernetwork or may be received from outside the router network, such as fromthe internet. For example, if a number of users received financial datafrom a common syndication source but the different users were interestedin different parts of the financial data, the syndication-capable routermay route portions of the syndicated data according to user criteria.Thus, for example, the router may handle data from a syndicated sourceof mortgage data by routing trading data for secondary mortgage marketsto one user (e.g., a bond fund manager), current mortgage rates to asecond user (e.g., a consumer), and mortgage qualification data to athird user (e.g., a retail bank).

The syndication-capable network router may be able to route syndicationdata feeds for at least one of personal data, financial data, medicaldata, enterprise data, or business data. The syndication-capable routermay be capable of routing syndication data feeds to a particular IPaddress on the network based on the syndication data contained in thefeed. In an embodiment, the syndication-capable network router may beable to filter spam, adware, or email by comparing an originating IP orURL to known spam, adware, or email addresses or to look for key wordswithin the incoming packets. The syndication-capable network router maybe able to filter, block, route, or permit at least one of onlineinformation sources such as news, newspapers, web magazines, academicpapers, government court opinions, administrative rulings, regulationupdates, opinions, editorials, product reviews, movie reviews, financialor market analyses, discussions of current events, internet media, andadvertisements by IP address, URL, syndication content, or packetheading. The syndication-capable network router may be able to filter,block, route, or permit at least one of internet based web pages,weblogs, websites, and web popups by IP address, URL, syndicationcontent, or packet heading.

The syndication-capable network router may be adapted to filter, block,route, or permit at least one of network packet traffic, IP address, MACaddress, and VoIP network packets based on originating source,destination address, or syndication content of the packet. Thesyndication-capable network router may be adapted to filter, block,route, or permit packets based on at least one of a syndication digitalsignature, syndication password or key, and syndication identitycertificate of the packets.

Filtering may be embedded into a firewall. A software or hardwarefirewall may incorporate syndication filtering. The firewall may beadapted to recognize syndicated content and further adapted to filter,block, or permit the syndicated content according to filter parameters.Filter parameters may be configured through an administrative interfaceto the firewall, such as a web-based user interface. Thesyndication-capable firewall may be adapted to filter, block, or permitat least one of personal data, financial data, medical data, enterprisedata, or business data based on the syndication application, syndicationincoming port, syndication incoming IP, syndication IP address, orsyndication content. The syndication-capable firewall may be adapted tofilter or block at least one of spam, adware, or email addresses basedon a syndication source IP address, a syndication source URL, orcontent. The syndication-capable firewall may be adapted to filter orblock at least one of internet based news, newspapers, web magazines,academic papers, government court opinions, administrative rulings,regulation updates, opinions, editorials, product reviews, moviereviews, financial or market analyses, discussions of current events,internet media, and advertisements by syndication IP address,syndication URL, syndication application, syndication port, syndicationcontent, or syndication heading. The syndication-capable firewall may beadapted to filter or block at least one of internet based web pages,weblogs, websites, and web popups by syndication IP address, syndicationURL, syndication application, syndication port, syndication content, orsyndication heading. The syndication-capable firewall may be adapted tofilter or block network packet traffic or IP addresses based onoriginating or destination syndication address.

Filtering may be embedded in a virus protection application. The virusprotection application may incorporate syndication filteringcapabilities. The syndication-capable virus protection application mayinspect attachments or enclosures to syndicated content or may analyzethe syndicated content itself for malicious instructions or the like.The syndication-capable virus protection application may be adapted toidentify, filter, and/or block viral syndication content and/orattachments in one or more of personal data, financial data, medicaldata, enterprise data, or business data, electronic mail, internet basedonline news, newspapers, web magazines, academic papers, governmentcourt opinions, administrative rulings, regulation updates, opinions,editorials, product reviews, movie reviews, financial or marketanalyses, discussions of current events, internet media, advertisements,web pages, weblogs, and websites based on known syndication viruscontent.

A filter may be deployed as a syndication attachment or enclosurefilter. This filter may be adapted to locate other syndicated content orsources of content. RSS data feeds, for example, may contain content orattachments that contain additional syndication data. A syndicationattachment file filter may scan messages from a syndicated data feed forattachments that may contain other syndication data in which a user hasinterest. For example, a medical data feed may have information that auser is interested in but may also contain an attachment with additionalmedical information. The syndication attachment file filter may be ableto determine if the attachment contains information that may be ofinterest to the user and either keep or omit the attachment from thereceived data feed. The filter may filter syndication attachments usingat least one of personal data, financial data, medical data, enterprisedata, or business data based on syndication content. The filter mayfilter attachments to other media types. For example, the filter mayscan electronic mail for syndication attachments and apply variousfiltering rules to any such attachments. As another example, the filtermay scan the content of a word processing document for references tosyndication sources and/or messages.

A filter may operate locally or remotely. For example, a client devicemay filter a weblog, or collection of weblogs, or aggregator output toremove items that are not of interest. In another aspect, a remoteweblog reader may filter content and transmit the filter output to aclient device. A weblog filter may filter feeds according to at leastone of personal data, financial data, medical data, enterprise data, orbusiness data based on user defined syndication content. The weblogfilter may filter feeds according to source using, such as, for example,filters based on internet based online news, newspapers, web magazines,academic papers, government court opinions, administrative rulings,regulation updates, opinions, editorials, product reviews, moviereviews, financial or market analyses, discussions of current events,internet media, and advertisements.

Websites may broadcast syndication data files that may contain a briefdescription of the content of the website. A syndication web contentfilter may be able to read the syndication data file content to blockaccess to a certain site based on any user defined feature. For example,a parent wanting to block a certain type of websites from a child may beable to define the type of site to block. The parent may define keywords, phrases, ratings, and so forth to look for in the syndicationdata file. The filter may block web sites according to one or more ofpersonal data, financial data, medical data, enterprise data, orbusiness data based on the user-defined syndication web site rating. Thesyndication web content filter may be adapted to block web sitescontaining at least one of internet based online news, newspapers, webmagazines, academic papers, government court opinions, administrativerulings, regulation updates, opinions, editorials, product reviews,movie reviews, financial or market analyses, discussions of currentevents, internet media, and advertisements based on the user definedsyndication web site rating. The syndication web content filter may beable to block at least one of web pages, weblogs, websites, and webbrowser content based on the user defined syndication web site rating.

An instant messaging (“IM”) application may incorporate a filter. Thesyndication-capable instant message application may be adapted to filtersyndication data feeds that may be received from another instant messageapplication either within an instant message or within an attachment orfile shared through an instant messaging system.

An anti-phishing program may incorporate a filter. Internet phishinggenerally takes the form of a request for user information for thepurposes of identity theft, credit card information, or monetarypayments. These requests may be sent to a user by email, instantmessage, or from the web and may incorporate a syndication data feed. Asyndication phishing filter may be able to block syndication phishingrequests based on the syndication content and definition by the user.

A search engine may incorporate a filter. An Internet search engine maycontain a filter adapted to identify sites that provide syndication datafeeds responsive to a user's definition. For example, a user may be ableto define a search for medical information on heart valves to get only alisting of syndication data feed sites with this information. The filtermay employ any of the parameters or filtering techniques describedabove.

A security appliance may incorporate a filter. Security appliancesoperate as reverse proxy devices positioned between any type of clientand a server to act as an additional layer of security forcommunications. A security appliance may perform checks for viruses,spam, phishing, or other undesired files sent to a server. The servermay be any kind of server such as an application server, email server,or web server. A syndication-capable security appliance may be adaptedto analyze syndication data feeds to determine the syndication data feedcontent and make decisions to block or pass the syndicated content ontothe server. The filter may employ any of the parameters or filteringtechniques described above. The syndication-capable security appliancemay be adapted to filter at least one of unwanted syndication networkpacket traffic, syndication IP addresses, and syndication MAC addressesfrom entering a server. The syndication-capable security appliance maybe adapted to filter at least one of unwanted syndication digitalsignatures, syndication passwords or keys, and syndication identitycertificates from entering a server.

Database applications (e.g. Oracle) may incorporate syndication filtercapabilities. Syndication data files may have the same structure as XML,using tags to indicate the beginning and end of information sections ofthe information or data. XML and syndication are becoming increasinglypopular for holding data because of their small size and data types theymay contain. A syndication-capable database application may be adaptedto search and filter data from syndication data sources in addition tothe same abilities for tables and databases. The syndication-capabledatabase application may be adapted to filter at least one of personaldata, financial data, medical data, enterprise data, or business datafrom syndication sources based on user or application requirements.

Filters may be integrated into an enterprise application. Enterpriseapplications may be adapted to search and filter data from acrosscorporate or local area networks, as well as wide area networksincluding the Internet. Enterprise data may be obtained from otherapplications and/or databases deployed within the enterprise, and theenterprise application may apply suitable connections and converters toread the data and/or convert the data to a common format. Asyndication-capable enterprise application may also be adapted to accessdata in syndication data files and syndication data feeds at localand/or remote locations. The syndication-capable enterprise applicationmay be adapted to use a search engine to locate syndication data feedson the internet that may have desired data based on a user's definition.The syndication-capable enterprise application may be adapted to filtersyndication data feeds or syndication data files based upon one or moreof personal data, financial data, medical data, enterprise data,business data. More generally, the syndication-capable enterpriseapplication may employ any of the filtering parameters and techniquesdescribed above.

A filter may provide semantic processing to process data according tosemantic content or meaning. The filter may be applied to data intables, databases, and syndication metadata, and it may permit searchingor handling of syndicated content based upon user-provided semanticparameters. The semantic filter may employ any of the filteringparameters or techniques described above.

A filter may provide encryption processing to permit filtering ofencrypted data. The filter may employ user-provided keys to decryptsyndicated content for further filtering and other processing. Thefilter may also, or instead, provide encryption processing to permitfiltering of data according to encryption characteristics such asencryption type, availability of public keys, and so forth. Theencryption filter may employ any of the filtering parameters ortechniques described above.

A filter may provide caller ID filtering. The filter may identify andextract caller information from a cellular phone, wired telephone,wireless telephone, VoIP telephone, or other telephonic device.Information may, for example, be published to a data feed or forwardedfor other processing. In another aspect, the filter may identify andextract telephone numbers and other contact information from a datafeed. The caller ID filter may employ any of the filtering parameters ortechniques described above.

A filter may provide content filtering. A channel blocking system may beprovided for a device to manage access to broadcast (e.g., radio ortelevision) or other transmissions. The transmission may be accompaniedby content ratings or other semantic data that may be employed by thechannel blocking system to restrict availability at a receiving deviceaccording to user preferences. In one aspect, the ratings may beprovided as a syndicated feed. In another aspect, the transmissions maybe processed to derive a feed of characteristic information which may,in turn, be applied by the channel blocking system to dynamicallyrestrict access according to current content and any user-providedconstraints. The filter may be applied to one or more of a radiobroadcast, a television broadcast, a satellite broadcast, a satelliteradio broadcast, a cable television channel, or the like. The filter mayemploy analysis including content analysis and analysis of digitalsignatures, passwords, keys, or identity certificates, and the like.

A filter may be associated with an analog-to-digital converter (ADC), adigital-to-analog converter (DAC), or a media coder/decoder (CODEC),referred to generally as digital processors. In one embodiment,characterizations of output such as sampling rate, compression ratios,frequency spectra, and the like may be provided to a feed fortransmission and processing along with the digital content. In anotheraspect, a data feed may be provided to guide downstream processing ofthe digital (or analog) signal. A filter may be applied to sort, select,block, or otherwise process associated media according to the data feed.

Similarly, any digital filter, including audio filters, digital filters,digital subscriber line filters, line filters, surface acoustic wavefilters, and the like, may be adapted to receive syndicated data thatprovide operating parameters for the filter, or it may be adapted topublish a feed of operational data. In an embodiment, the syndicationsignal processing platform may be adapted to process at least one of anaudio signal, electronic signal, analog signal, digital signal, andvideo signal using a syndication signal processing platform which uses aprovided set of parameters from a syndication data file or syndicationdata feed.

Healthcare institutions, including but not limited to, hospitals,short-term care facilities, long-term care facilities, outpatienttreatment centers, hospices, nursing homes, mental health facilities,government facilities (e.g. Veterans' Affairs hospitals), specialtyclinics, and the like, must continually monitor a vast array ofinformation to ensure the ongoing delivery of safe and effectiveclinical treatment, all while operating in an increasingly restrictivefiscal environment. Central to a healthcare institution's ability tomanage and maintain high quality care is information. Medical journalsregularly report on numerous quality improvements needed in health caredelivery, such as minimizing the under use, over use, and/or misuse ofcare, minimizing clinical errors, reducing costs, and so forth.Approaches such as conformance to clinical standards, total qualitymanagement, outcomes measurement, accreditation and accountability,healthcare provider training and performance monitoring, cost trackingand cost-effectiveness analysis, patient education, infrastructuremonitoring, and others are all used to systematically measure, analyze,and optimize the healthcare delivery of institutions.

Healthcare institutions are responsible for continuous improvement inhealthcare delivery. In order to assess such broad terms as “quality”and “improvement,” standards are necessary, as is the ability to obtaininformation enabling an institution to conduct periodic assessments ofperformance, policy and procedure. This is essentially an ongoing auditof performance enabling a systematic appraisal of an institution.Conceptually the components of this audit may be thought of as (i)infrastructure (e.g., physical/equipment needs of an institution), (ii)process (what is done, when, how, by whom, etc.), and (iii) outcomes(what occurred, how do these occurrences compare to standards, otherinstitutions, etc.). Data recording, information retrieval and analysisare requisite for a valid audit of institutional structure, process, andoutcomes.

For example, evidence-based medicine has as its goal to assist healthcare practitioners, patients, and policymakers to make better decisionsby basing clinical decisions on the best evidence available, such asclinical studies, panel reports, the reports of accreditation bodies,and the like. At its most basic, the goal of evidence-based medicine isto have healthcare providers base their decisions on the best empiricalevidence available. As information is added to the collective medicalevidence, for example, through new clinical studies, evidence-basedmedicine provides a means for getting this data to healthcare providersin order to provide a means for continuous learning and for improvingcare. However, many healthcare providers may have problems acquiring theskills needed to conduct appropriate searches and review the relevantliterature or to consult databases within the context of their dailywork. Thus, there is wide variation in the delivery of medical care andthe quality of the care delivered. Greater access to clinicalinformation should result in reduced morbidity and mortality withinhealthcare institutions. Syndication technologies may provideopportunities for providing evidence-based data, and many other types ofhealthcare data, to healthcare providers in order to assist continuallyimproving healthcare delivery.

Despite widespread interest in collecting and disseminating healthcareinformation and the billions of dollars spent on the infrastructure andtraining necessary to collect, analyze, disseminate, and use thatinformation, much of institutional healthcare and associated datacollection/delivery lags far behind in technical sophistication,efficiency and usefulness. Many institutions do not pursue systems forcollecting information that may be used to improving healthcare deliverybecause the endeavor is simply too costly. Many institutions that doinvest in such informational infrastructure often do so to meet onlytheir own unique internal needs and circumstances. Thus, the costly datacollected and analyzed at great cost by one institution may be of littleor no relevance to another institution due to the lack of congruence inthe data needs of the two intuitions. The result may be very costlyvertical information systems with minimal horizontal links.

For example, following a series of clinical errors, Hospital A maydecide to implement a new information collection and analysis system formonitoring the treatment of cardiovascular patients within theinstitution. Data such as medication usage, frequency of patientfollow-up, referrals, interventions, etc. may all be collected as partof this program, and, most likely, stored in a relational database fromwhich reports may be derived and analyses made. Hospital B may also havea keen interest in these clinical data and collect similar fields in itsown proprietary database. For purposes of comparison, benchmarking,patient mix analysis, outcomes, etc. it would be very useful (and costefficient) for Hospitals A and B to be able to share their data in someanonymous manner. However, suppose, as is often the case, that HospitalsA and B differ in many respects institutionally, and have different usesto which they seek to put the data. Hospital A may have a differentpharmaceutical formulary that Hospital B. Hospital A may recordmedication side effects as “None, Mild, Moderate, Extensive,” whileHospital B records side effects as “Nausea, Rash, Increased BloodPressure, etc.” Hospital A may not have a surgical program, thus itspatients must be referred to another institution for bypass surgery andso data regarding this treatment and its outcomes is not included inHospital A's dataset. Conversely, Hospital B may have extensive surgicalprograms, all of which generate data that is of great interest andincluded in Hospital B's dataset. These inconsistencies do not entirelyrule out the sharing of data between the institutions. For example, itis possible that they could share information about medications that areprescribed at both institutions, and so forth. Unfortunately, minimaloverlap, coding differences, and the like make such information sharingrequire extensive retrospective re-formatting that further increases thecost of the data. Not surprisingly, inter-institutional comparisonsother than those formalized in clinical trials are therefore uncommon.If, instead, institutions recorded and had access to syndicatedhealthcare information, from which unique feeds could be tailored toindividual institutional needs, certain problems, such as those ofinstitutional intercommunication described above, may be minimized, withimprovement of the usefulness and efficiency of health care informationfor institutions.

Effective institutional healthcare delivery may require several steps.First, goals and quality standards must be defined, and to the extentpossible, must be measurable. Second, specific, measurable indicatorsrelating to those definitions must then be selected. Definitions maycome from accrediting bodies, third-party insurers, physician groups(e.g. the AMA), patient advocacy groups, or set to standards and goalsthat are internal to a particular institution. Third, data arecollected. Data quality increases insofar as it is more accessible, hasgreater validity and completeness, and is relevant to the institutionalgoal(s) for which it is intended to serve. Fourth, summary and/oranalyses of the data are provided. Finally, data delivery must occur,preferably in a manner consistent with the needs, aptitudes, andpreferences of the data's end-users.

Layered over this sequential data infrastructure are the domains of ahealthcare institution, each with a potentially unique set ofcircumstances impacting each step of the data infrastructure. Forexample, conformance to clinical standards, total quality management,outcomes measurement, accreditation and accountability, healthcareprovider training and performance monitoring, cost tracking andcost-effectiveness analysis, patient education, infrastructuremonitoring, and others may each share a core set of data needs, but haveadditional data requirements not shared by the other domains. Syndicateddata technologies may be useful for implementing the data processingsteps described herein in a decentralized manner and enabling differentinstitutional domains to interact with the information collected by thedecentralized data infrastructure to systematically measure, analyze,and optimize the healthcare delivery of an institution's domain in themanner best suited to the unique goals of a particular domain of ahealthcare institution.

Healthcare institutions must conform to standards of care in order toobtain accreditation, maintain relationships with third-party insurers,and the like. A number of organizations publish and report on standardsof care, such as the Joint Commission on the Accreditation of HealthcareOrganizations (JCAHO), the National Committee for Quality Assurance(NCQA), and others. Some standards may refer to the management of ahealthcare institutions (e.g. maintaining records on the credentials ofall staff physicians), while others may be quite specific to a diseasestate and how to best treat it. NCQA's HEDIS 3.0 database includesmeasures to assess the effectiveness of care. JCAHO mandates thathealthcare institutions collect data on performance, and medicalspecialty organizations, such as the American College of Cardiology, mayderive and publish best practices for a specific condition (e.g. how toevaluate and treat new-onset angina.

In particular, clinical practice guidelines may provide a healthcareinstitution, its physicians and other healthcare providers withinformation regarding the appropriate treatment of a wide variety ofconditions. Practice guidelines incorporate the best scientific evidencewith expert opinion and represent recommendations based on rigorousclinical research and soundly generated professional consensus.Guidelines may also be useful sources of comparative data if theguidelines are explicit and there is good scientific evidence to supportthe recommendations. For example, there is good evidence to suggest thatcertain therapies should be administered within the first six hoursfollowing a myocardial infarction. This is a rigorously studiedguideline and is widely accepted. Syndicated data may be used todisseminate this information to, and within, a healthcare institution,as well as used to collect and disseminate information pertain to theinstitution's performance and conformance with the guideline.Accrediting institutions, researchers, and other interested parties may,in turn, aggregate this syndicated data across a clinical specialty,geographic region, and so forth to derive norms of care, comparativestudies, and the like.

As in other industries, healthcare institutions have found value inquality improvement techniques such as Total Quality Management (TQM),Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI), and other similar methods. TQM andCQI derive from management research on methods for measuring performanceand using this information to continuously monitor systemic outcomes andimprove the quality of services, goods, and the like. Systematicmonitoring of clinical performance within a healthcare institution,permits parties within the institution to receive information on theirperformance and make improvements where necessary, and permitsadministrators to evaluate the institution's systems and processes at amacro level, aggregating information on individuals' performances withinthe institution.

For example, healthcare administrators within an institution may beinterested in improving the wait times in the Emergency Room. As part ofa TQM/CQI project, data could be collected on each patient who visitsthe ER within a defined period of time, this data could be combined withother useful information, such as, day of the week, time of day of thevisit, injury causing the ER visit, and so on. Once these data areaggregated and analyzed it may be possible to spot trends or problemareas that may be improved. Perhaps Friday nights are associated withparticularly long wait times. This information might promptadministrators to increase staffing on these nights, and so on. Aneffective TQM/CQI project must have valid and reliable information thatis readily available to the appropriate parties who may use thisinformation to improve institutional healthcare delivery. Syndicateddata may be used to interact with information associated with a TQM/CQIproject within a healthcare institution, used to aggregate TQM/CQI datafor purposes of comparison, summary, and the like. Similar projectscould record clinical errors, events (e.g. intubation required, CPRadministered), morbidity, mortality, and so forth, as part of a TQM/CQIprocess to reduce error rates and improve patient safety. Thissyndicated data, in turn, could be aggregated at a city, state, ornational level for the purposes of administrative decision making,resource allocation, accreditation, and so forth.

Training healthcare providers and the monitoring the performance ofproviders at all levels are fundamental to a successful healthcareinstitution. However, measurement in this domain is notoriouslydifficult. For example, in many instances it is not meaningful to hold asingle provider individually responsible for a patient's outcomes,because a given patient's treatment is likely to be shared by severalproviders, perhaps with different clinical specialties and differentlevels of training, and even shared across healthcare institutions (e.g.physician group office, hospital, home care, etc.). As another example,it is difficult to establish standards of competence for differenttraining levels, because trainees assimilate information and acquireskills at different rates throughout the prolonged (often multiyear)period of training.

Further complicating measurement in this domain is the case mix ofpatients in different hospitals. A provider working in a public hospitalmay see patients in a more advanced disease state than her cross-towncolleague working at a private hospital in an affluent neighborhood. Thelower socioeconomic status of the public hospital's patients may beassociated with a variety of comorbid disorders derived fromsocioeconomic deficiencies. For example, in the public hospital theremay be a high level of uninsured patients who do not as often visitphysicians' offices, and delay seeking care when it is needed. Thus, tocompare the performance of the public and private hospital providers ona variable such as “Lower Systolic Blood Pressure Ten Points withinThree Months of First Consultation” is not a valid comparison, as it isconfounded by the different case mix of the two institutions.

In spite of these difficulties, measuring performance, monitoringprovider training, and the like are necessary in order to identify areasthat need improvement, signal the accomplishment of goals, and respondto the need for accountability. The steering committee of a healthcareinstitution must ensure that staff members receive proper training, thatthis training is in evidence within individuals' clinical practice, andthat it serves to maintain and/or improve upon desired performancelevels. In response to t information pertaining to training andperformance, institutional task forces may be formed to focus onspecific staff competencies that appear weak. Systematic monitoring ofhealthcare providers' training and performance within a healthcareinstitution permits parties within the institution to receiveinformation on their performance and make improvements where necessary,and permits administrators to evaluate the institution's systems andprocesses at a macro level, aggregating information on individuals'performances within the institution. Cross-institutional data may alsobe collected, permitting specialty organizations to monitor the trainingand credentialing process for their residents and fellows.

Syndicated data may be used to monitor providers' training andperformance within a healthcare institution in a more passive,decentralize manner. For example, whereas a traditional performancemeasurement project would very likely specify in advance variables tocollect, where and when to collect the data, create a new database ordataset within a database, and so on, a syndicated data infrastructurecould systematically tag institutional records for later interaction aspart of performance monitoring, but without having to, a priori, decidethe specifics of all intended analyses. Training and performanceparameters may also be provided to cross-institutional organizationssuch as medical schools comprising a number of teaching hospitals, ormedical specialty organizations.

In addition to clinical effectiveness, healthcare institutions must alsocontinually demonstrate optimal fiscal management. Cost-effectivenessstudies, cost benefit analysis, and simple cost tracking are all toolsused to measure the economic value of services provided by healthcareinstitutions. Cost-effectiveness analyses have as their goal to describethe cost of obtaining health outcomes as a means for determining theappropriateness of various treatment options. For example, acost-effectiveness study may seek to quantify the cost of threetreatment options for a narrowed coronary artery (medication,angioplasty, bypass surgery) to obtain the same outcome, such as, “Freeof Myocardial Infarction.” The study would then quantify the cost foreach year that a patient, on average, is free from having a heartattack. More invasive procedures, like bypass surgery, may increase thenumber of years that a patient is free from heart attack, as compared topharmaceutical treatment alone, but at a significantly higher cost. Thisinformation may then be aggregated with other data (e.g. patientfactors, provider factors, institutional factors) that affect outcomes.Data like these are often used to determine the appropriate timetablefor health screenings. For example, it is likely that testing malesevery year from birth for prostate cancer would result in lessening themortality from this disease to some slight degree. However, so few menunder age 35 have prostate cancer that testing all men under this age isnot cost effective. Thus, standards must be derived based, in part, onthe balance between obtaining a desired outcome (detect cancer) andeconomic necessities (keep the cost of each cancer detected below $X).The result enables healthcare providers and administrators to balancethe desire to meet treatment objectives with prudent fiscal management.Cost benefit analysis is another method for measuring the net benefit ofan intervention, but with costs and benefits both expressed in financialunits. The data necessary for cost-related analyses may be stored by ahealthcare institution in a syndicated format for later interaction.

As with the cost effectiveness of clinical outcomes, healthcareinstitutions must also gather information regarding the value of patienteducation programs. Patient education is intended, among other things,to improve compliance with treatment regimens and help patients tobetter understand and self-manage their health. For example, ahealthcare institution may create a patient education program forcardiology patients that includes teaching patients how to recognizesymptoms associated with an impending heart attack, so that should suchsymptoms occur, they are better able to contact healthcare personnel forhelp. As another example, educational programs may improve patients'compliance in taking their medications and adhering to a follow-up careplan. As a further example, patient education may improve clinicaloutcomes by improving communication between doctor and patient, aspatients learn how to discuss their symptoms with their physician, askimportant questions, and clear up any misunderstanding they might haveabout their health condition. A healthcare institution may collect datarelating to patient education programs and measurable clinical outcomesand store these data in a syndicated format for later use in evaluatingthe usefulness and cost-benefit of the programs.

Contemporary medicine is heavily reliant upon the devices and physicalplant of healthcare institutions to administer appropriate care. Complexmedical devices and equipment require monitoring and maintenance inorder to prevent device-related clinical errors. Device-related mistakesmay be due to (i) device failures (e.g. component failure), (ii)external factors (e.g. electrical surges or outages, (iii) system errors(e.g. improper training, poor maintenance), or (iv) operator error (e.g.human misuse of a device). Device-related data, for example pertainingto device-related error, may be stored in a syndicated format. Fromthese syndicated data, for example, it may be possible to create feedsthat alert institutions to possible device-related problems. Moreover,For example, institutions may record their device-related data in asyndicated format that is shared with an overseeing body. The overseeingbody may aggregate this information from a multitude of institutions andglean useful information on devices that seem to be associated withdevice failures, that appear to be more difficult to use and, thus, havehigh operator error, and so forth. This summary information could, inturn, be stored in a syndicated format and feed to institutions so thatthey may be better aware of current or potential device problems.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with evidence-basedinformation, such as medical research, clinical trial findings, casestudies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations, and the like ina syndicated format to enable an institution to continually update itsrepository of evidence-based medical knowledge via syndicated dataobtained through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel.The syndicated information may include full academic journal articles,article abstracts, customized article summaries, clinic trial data,clinical trial analyses, published standards of care, published clinicalindicators for medications, published indicators for interventions,appropriateness scores for certain classes of clinical profiles andcorresponding treatment options, and the like. For example, aninstitution engaged in a high volume cardiology practice may be able tosubscribe to syndicated data feeds for particular research journals,organizations, and the like, and receive regular updates on new clinicalfindings, recommendations, changes in standards of care, and so forth.

In embodiments, syndicated evidence-based information, such as medicalresearch, clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles,academic presentations, and the like, may be plotted, displayed,analyzed, or the like and distributed to an RSS-enabled client.

In embodiments, syndicated evidence-based information, such as medicalresearch, clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles,academic presentations, and the like, may be associated with anapplication 406 consisting of a client-side program. As used in thisapplication, the client-side program may be healthcare software and/oran application. The client-side program may be formatted to operate onclient devices such as, a desktop computer, laptop computer, “pocket”personal computer, a cellular phone, Blackberry, personal digitalassistant, or other SMS text-enabled device, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated evidence-based information, such as medicalresearch, clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles,academic presentations, and the like, may be associated with anaggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated evidence-based information, such as medicalresearch, clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles,academic presentations, and the like, may be associated with a contentmanagement system that may provide summaries of the syndicated dataavailable, dates associated with the syndicated data, links to accessthe full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedevidence-based information, such as medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like, through the use of an application 406 providing socialnetworking. As used in this application, social networking may enabletwo or more individuals to view, receive, send and/or interact with oneor more pieces of information. The two or more individuals may bemembers of a network, such as a network of healthcare providers. The oneor more pieces of information may be syndicated information or data,such as syndicated evidence-based information, syndicated data regardingadverse events, standards, clinical practice guidelines andrecommendations, clinical processes, training and credentials,performance, errors and outcomes, expenditures on patient care, such asdiscussed herein.

For example, through social networking an institution may be able tocommunicate and share syndicated data with other healthcare institutionswith whom the institution shares patient populations, clinicalspecialties, clinical population types, and the like. The clinicalfactors of relevance to institutions that seek to share syndicated datamay be published with detailed tags to provide narrowly tailored oreasily filtered RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channelsfor ongoing data sharing. Such a process may allow institutions who carefor similar patient populations to aggregate data for more robustanalysis.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedevidence-based information, such as medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like, through the use of an application 406 providing a userinterface 700 for viewing data, records, and the like. For example, aclient 102 may, in response to user input such as clicking on a title ofan item in the user interface 700, retrieve the underlying item from thecontent source 204 as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedevidence-based information, such as medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like, through the use of an application 406 associated with amedia viewer or directly through a media viewer. For example, an RSSitem may refer to an image source, such as an MRI image in a medicalrecord from a hospital, and may specify a viewer for the source imagethat is available through a registry such as a registry for services ina services oriented architecture. In operation, a client (e.g. aphysician) with appropriate permissions to view the image (also asmanaged, e.g., through the metadata for the enhanced syndicationsystem), may retrieve the appropriate viewer service from the registry,and apply the viewer to view the source image. In another aspect,viewers or links to viewer software may be syndicated for global accessacross the healthcare institution so that new media formats orimprovements to rendering or other functionality for existing mediaformats may be published for use throughout the institution. Thesuitability of a viewer may depend on the hardware capabilities of aclient, the operating system of a client, and the like, and thesyndicated message containing the image may specify a number ofdifferent possible viewers, such as viewers for different client devicetypes.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedevidence-based information, such as medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like, through the use of an application 406 providing verticalmarket integration. For example, as hospital physicians update themedications and dosages of their patient population following clinicalvisits, this data may be aggregated and republished by clinicalspecialty (e.g. cardiology patients) and this syndicated data may thenbe provided to the administrators of the respective clinical areas viaan RSS feed 202 and may permit the administrators to more efficientlyallocate resources, plan personnel, and the like. As used in thisapplication, the application 406 providing for vertical marketintegration may provide conditional access that allows a participant ina healthcare hierarchy to view, receive, send and/or interact withinformation according to the participant's position in the hierarchy.

Referring to FIG. 13, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated evidence-based information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may select and filter one or more sources ofevidence-based information for republication. Users 1304, such as users404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact with thesyndicated data/information 1302 directly or through anapplication/interface/other 1308. The users 1304 may also interact witheach other. The application/interface/other 1308 may be a client-sideprogram, such as the healthcare program discussed herein, a socialnetworking application, a user interface, such as user interface 700,800 and/or 900, an application in connection with a media viewer, amedia viewer and/or an application providing for vertical marketintegration, such as described herein. The application/interface/other1308 may also employ or expose services, such as those described inreference to FIG. 4. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 13 may bedata feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedevidence-based information, such as medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like, using database functions that may permit the data qualityto be verified, provide for transformation of the data, enablesearching, filtering, or clustering the patient data, or categorizingthe data into hierarchies, interrelationships, interrelated groups, andthe like.

Referring to FIG. 14, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated evidence-based information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a databasefunction 1402. The database function 1402 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The database function 1402 may be a databasefunction as described herein, such as related to data quality, datatransformation, searching, filtering, clustering, a search engine,information relationships, hierarchical relationships andcategorization, such as described herein. The database function 1402may, for example, be deployed as a service in a registry of a servicesoriented architecture. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 14 maybe data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedevidence-based information, such as medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like, using semantic rules 412 that enable, for example, thecreation or processing of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may also providefor metadata enrichment of syndicated or aggregated data, interpretationor translation of aggregated data, as well as permit the creation ofknowledge structures expressed, for example, using OPML, and the use ofa dictionary or thesaurus.

Referring to FIG. 15, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated evidence-based information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a semanticfacility 1502. The semantic facility 1502 may, for example, providecontext for or interpretation of syndicated data to improve end userexperience, or may filter syndicated data using semantically orientedrules. The semantic facility 1502 may also interact directly with thesyndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may also interact witheach other. The semantic facility 1502 may provide or be related tosemantic rules, metadata creation, metadata enrichment, interpretationof aggregated data, such as syndicated data/information 1302,translation of aggregated data, such as syndicated data/information1302, creation of knowledge structures, a dictionary and/or a thesaurus,such as described herein. The semantic facility 1502 may be deployed asdescribed above with reference to, for example, FIGS. 4 and 5. Incertain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 15 may be data feeds, such asdata feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may publish and/or subscribe toand/or interact with syndicated evidence-based information, such asmedical research, clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewedarticles, academic presentations, and the like, to which others maysubscribe and/or publish and/or with which others may interact.Community physicians, for example, may subscribe to syndicatedevidence-based information generated by an academic medical center(e.g., the Mayo Clinic), or by a medical specialty organization (e.g.,the American College of Surgeons). Community physicians may also publishtheir own results as part of a decentralized data collection projectsponsored by such an institution, so that the experience of individualphysicians is captured as part of the institution's data set.

In embodiments, the syndicated evidence-based information, such asmedical research, clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewedarticles, academic presentations, and the like, may be furtherassociated with information that may provide for the management of thedata. For example, the aggregated data may list the author of theaggregated data, the date on which it was authored, etc. Thus, the datamay provide for further aggregation, republication, and the like. In theexample above, where community physicians are contributing data to anacademic dataset, such community-sourced data may be designated as such,allowing subsequent statistical analysis and substantive analysis torecognize the different parameters accompanying community-basedobservations as contrasted with academic-based observations. In thisexample, community-based surgeons may have a different rate ofpost-operative infection with different microorganisms than theacademic-based surgical staff, reflecting the differences in the type ofmicroorganisms found in the two environments, the differences in patientmix and illness severity, and the like.

Referring to FIG. 16, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated evidence-based information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through asyndication facility 1602. The syndication facility 1602 may alsointeract directly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users1304 may also interact with each other. The syndication facility 1602may publish, subscribe to, aggregate and republish aggregated data, suchas syndicated data/information 1302, such as described herein. Thesyndication facility 1602 may also manage syndication information 1302,such as described herein. The syndication facility 1602 may, forexample, be deployed as a service in a services oriented architecture orusing the other techniques described above with reference to FIGS. 4 and5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 16 may be data feeds, suchas data feed 202. A user 1304 may also publish, republish and/orsubscribe to a content source 204, data feed 202, aggregator 210 and/orsyndication facility 1602.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedevidence-based information, such as medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like, within an infrastructure 416 that provides for datasecurity, authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSSfeeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pingingtechnology, and/or other communications. A subscriber to an academicmedical center's syndicated evidence-based information may need toprovide credentials demonstrating her academic affiliation before shecan access certain types of data such as complication rates forparticular procedures. A researcher investigating, for example,complication rates for a particular procedure as part of a scientific,cross-institutional study may be granted deidentified access tocomplication data for the academic medical center, but again only afterproviding certain credentials acceptable to the institution.

Referring to FIG. 17, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated evidence-based information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through aninfrastructure 1702. The infrastructure 1702 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The infrastructure 1702 may, for example,provide services for an enhanced syndication environment such assecurity, authentication, traffic management, logging, pinging and/orcommunications, such as described herein. The infrastructure 1702 may,for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 17may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedevidence-based information, such as medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like, that is associated with special formatting and/or displayproperties. A case study or series of cases from a medical center may bemade available to subscribers, for example, in a format suitable forcontinuing medical education (“CME”) purposes. The CME-oriented casereport may be followed by a series of questions to permit CME credits,or the case report may be accompanied by links to related peer-reviewedjournal articles or abstracts. Non-CME subscribers to the same casestudy may not have access to the CME formatting and display.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedevidence-based information, such as medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like, that is associated with special identification and/orde-identification properties. For example, a syndicated case study froma hospital may be available to subscribers for CME purposes with patientdeidentification. The same case study may be accompanied by demographicdata if the subscriber is a clinical researcher.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedevidence-based information, such as medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like, that is associated with properties allowing fortransactional processing. The transactions may be financialtransactions, such as related to medical reimbursement and/orsubscription fees or other charges for access to the syndicatedevidence-based information.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedevidence-based information, such as medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like, that is associated with restricted or conditional accessproperties. Clinical researchers at decentralized institutionsparticipating in a clinical trial, for example, may have access to dataaccumulated at multiple centers in real time, while other subscribersmay not be permitted access until all data have been accumulated for theentire trial.

Referring to FIG. 18, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated evidence-based information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith infrastructure 1702 the syndicated data/information 1302. The users1304 may also interact with each other. The syndicated data/information1302 may be associated with special properties 1802. The specialproperties 1802 may, for example, relate to formatting, display,identification, de-identification, transactions, restricted accessand/or conditional access, or other properties or characteristics ofsyndicated content as described herein. In certain embodiments thearrows of FIG. 18 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding the occurrence and details of adverse events within aninstitution to enable an institution to continually update its morbidityand mortality data via syndicated data obtained through an RSS feed 202,web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel. In embodiments, syndicated dataregarding the occurrence and details of adverse events within aninstitution may be plotted, displayed, analyzed, or the like anddistributed to an RSS-enabled client. In one aspect, the data may bepublished in its analyzed form. In another aspect, the data may bepublished in raw form for analysis and display with a client-sideapplication.

In embodiments, syndicated data regarding the occurrence and details ofadverse events within an institution may be plotted, displayed,analyzed, or the like. The processed data may be associated with anapplication 406 consisting of a client-side program. The client-sideprogram may be formatted to operate on client devices such as, a desktopcomputer, laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like. In one aspect, the data may be published in itsanalyzed form. In another aspect, the data may be published in anunprocessed form for analysis and display with a client-sideapplication.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding the occurrence and details ofadverse events within an institution may be associated with anaggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding the occurrence and details ofadverse events within an institution may be associated with a contentmanagement system that may provide summaries of the syndicated dataavailable, dates associated with the syndicated data, links to accessthe full, non-summarized data, and the like. The content managementsystem may be deployed within an enhanced syndication system using, forexample, the security, semantic processing, infrastructure, and othercomponents of the architecture described above with reference to FIG. 4.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding the occurrence and details of adverse events within aninstitution through the use of an application 406 that provides socialnetworking. For example, through social networking an institution may beable to communicate and share syndicated data with other healthcareinstitutions with whom the institution shares patient populations,clinical specialties, clinical population types, and the like. Theclinical factors of relevance to institutions who seek to sharesyndicated data may be identified with detailed tags or other metadatathat provides narrowly tailored RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams,or RSS channels for ongoing data sharing. It will be understood that aninstitution may optionally publish a relatively large number of feeds,each with a narrow semantic domain, or a relatively small number offeeds with suitable metadata or tagging for a subscribing institution tofilter the feeds effectively. Such a process may allow institutions whocare for similar patient populations to aggregate data for more robustanalysis.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding the occurrence and details of adverse events within aninstitution through the use of an application 406 providing a userinterface 700 for viewing data, records, and the like. For example, aclient 102 may, in response to user input such as clicking on a title ofan item in the user interface 700, retrieve the underlying item from thecontent source 204 as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding the occurrence and details of adverse events within aninstitution through the use of an application 406 associated with amedia viewer or directly through a media viewer. For example, an RSSitem may refer to an image source, such as an MRI image in a medicalrecord from a hospital, and may specify a viewer for the source imagethat is available through the registry. In operation, a client (e.g. aphysician) with appropriate permissions to view the image (also asmanaged, e.g., through the metadata for the enhanced syndicationsystem), may retrieve the appropriate viewer service from the registry,and apply the viewer to view the source image. Data regarding adverseevents may be captured in graphical form, for example as a digitalphotograph of a wound resulting from a malfunctioning grounding pad, ora wound resulting from a surgical infection. A media viewer may includea comparator program, so that differences in digital images may beidentified. For example, the changes in a wound across time may bemonitored so that its healing progress may be monitored and correlatedwith its severity. A malfunctioning grounding pad that causes aslowly-healing deep second degree burn, for example, poses a greaterhazard than a similar device that causes a less severe second degreeburn that heals rapidly. Relating sequential digital images to eachother with a comparator program may permit the tracking of adverseevents.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding the occurrence and details of adverse events within aninstitution through the use of an application 406 providing verticalmarket integration.

Referring again to FIG. 13, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated information related to adverse events as described herein.The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 ormay originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 ordirectly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or throughan application/interface/other 1308. The users 1304 may also interactwith each other. The application/interface/other 1308 may be aclient-side program, such as the healthcare program discussed herein, asocial networking application, a user interface, such as user interface700, 800 and/or 900, an application in connection with a media viewer, amedia viewer and/or an application providing for vertical marketintegration, such as described herein. The application/interface/other1308 may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 13may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding the occurrence and details of adverse events within aninstitution using one or more database functions that may permit thedata quality to be verified, provide for transformation of the data,enable searching, filtering, or clustering the patient data, orcategorizing the data into hierarchies, interrelationships, interrelatedgroups, and the like. Data collected for medical recordkeeping, forexample, may be filtered and/or searched to identify adverse events thatwere not originally catalogued as such. Such database functions mayallow for the identification of previously-unrecognized adverse events.For example, the medical records of a series of patients receiving aparticular drug may show a transient but significant low white bloodcell count that had not been previously associated with administeringthe drug.

Referring again to FIG. 14, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated information related to adverse events as described herein.The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 ormay originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 ordirectly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through adatabase function 1402. The database function 1402 may also interactdirectly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 mayalso interact with each other. The database function 1402 may be adatabase function as described herein, such as related to data quality,data transformation, searching, filtering, clustering, a search engine,information relationships, hierarchical relationships andcategorization, such as described herein. The database function 1402may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 14may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding the occurrence and details of adverse events within aninstitution that is associated with semantic rules 412 that enable thecreation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadataenrichment of aggregated data, interpretation or translation ofaggregated data, as well as permit the creation of knowledge structures(e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like.Abnormalities in blood tests or urine tests may be tagged as designatinga particular organ function, for example, so that all tests pertainingto renal function, liver function, cardiac function, and the like, maybe identified and aggregated to facilitate identification of adverseevents.

Referring again to FIG. 15, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated information related to adverse events as described herein.The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 ormay originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 ordirectly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through asemantic facility 1502. The semantic facility 1502 may also interactdirectly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 mayalso interact with each other. The semantic facility 1502 may provide orbe related to semantic rules, metadata creation, metadata enrichment,interpretation of aggregated data, such as syndicated data/information1302, translation of aggregated data, such as syndicateddata/information 1302, creation of knowledge structures, a dictionaryand/or a thesaurus, such as described herein. The semantic facility 1502may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 15may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may publish and/or subscribe toand/or interact with syndicated data regarding the occurrence anddetails of adverse events within an institution to which others maysubscribe and/or publish and/or with which others may interact. Forexample, within an institution all physicians may be able to subscribeto an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel, “CPR” thatregularly updates and retrieves information from across the entireinstitution on instances of the use of CPR on patients, and which isaggregated with other syndicated data on CPR rates from outside theinstitution's patient population.

In embodiments, the syndicated data regarding the occurrence and detailsof adverse events within an institution may be further associated withinformation that may provide for the management of the data. Forexample, the aggregated data may list the author of the aggregated data,the date on which it was authored, etc. Thus, the data may provide forfurther aggregation, republication, and the like. A variety of authors,for example, may contribute syndicated data about a particular adverseevent, for example a surgical complication. A surgeon, a nurse and ananesthesiologist may all contribute data to an adverse event filepertaining to post-operative nerve compression syndromes. A physicaltherapist may contribute additional information pertaining to therecovery of patients who have suffered such injuries. Authorshipinformation may allow management of these contributions as thecollection and analysis of data progress.

Referring again to FIG. 16, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated information related to adverse events as described herein.The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 ormay originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 ordirectly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through asyndication facility 1602. The syndication facility 1602 may alsointeract directly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users1304 may also interact with each other. The syndication facility 1602may publish, subscribe to, aggregate and republish aggregated data, suchas syndicated data/information 1302, such as described herein. Thesyndication facility 1602 may also manage syndication information 1302,such as described herein. The syndication facility 1602 may, forexample, be deployed as a service in a services oriented architecture orusing the other techniques described above with reference to FIGS. 4 and5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 16 may be data feeds, suchas data feed 202. A user 1304 may also publish, republish and/orsubscribe to a content source 204, data feed 202, aggregator 210 and/orsyndication facility 1602.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding the occurrence and details of adverse events within aninstitution within an infrastructure 416 that provides for datasecurity, authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSSfeeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pingingtechnology, and/or other communications. The Operating Room supervisor,for example, may desirably be alerted by pinging technology for eachadverse event connected to an operating room device. This supervisor,likely a member of the nursing staff, may not have access to datapertaining to surgeon error until after such data have been reviewed ina quality control peer-review setting. Appropriate infrastructurechannels and protects such data according to hospital staff“need-to-know” provisions.

Referring again to FIG. 17, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated information related to adverse events as described herein.The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 ormay originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 ordirectly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or throughan infrastructure 1702. The infrastructure 1702 may also interactdirectly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 mayalso interact with each other. The infrastructure 1702 may provide or berelated to security, authentication, traffic management, logging,pinging and/or communications, such as described herein. Theinfrastructure 1702 may, for example, be deployed as a service in aservices oriented architecture or using the other techniques describedabove with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrowsof FIG. 17 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding the occurrence and details of adverse events within aninstitution that is associated with or contains (such as withinmetadata) special formatting and/or display properties. In embodiments,healthcare institutions may interact with syndicated data regarding theoccurrence and details of adverse events within an institution that isassociated with or contains special identification and/orde-identification properties. Such deidentification may permitintra-institutional or inter-institutional researchers to collect datapertaining to adverse events without compromising patientconfidentiality and without interfering with institution-based errorreview procedures. In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interactwith syndicated data regarding the occurrence and details of adverseevents within an institution that is associated with or containsmetadata describing properties allowing for transactional processing.The transactions may be financial transactions, such as related tomedical reimbursement and/or subscription fees or other charges foraccess to the syndicated evidence-based information.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding the occurrence and details of adverse events within aninstitution that is associated with restricted or conditional accessproperties. Conditional access may allow researchers access to adverseevent data, as described above, while preventing undesirable outsiderssimilar access. Conditional access may be granted based on certaincredentials. Information available via syndication may be restricted tocertain classes of data, for example event description without otherclinical disclosure, to prevent the information from being used forpurposes inconsistent with institutional needs.

Referring again to FIG. 18, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated information related to adverse events as described herein.The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 ormay originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 ordirectly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Theinfrastructure 1702 may also interact directly with the syndicateddata/information 1302. The users 1304 may also interact with each other.The syndicated data/information 1302 may be associated with specialproperties 1802. The special properties 1802 may be related toformatting, display, identification, de-identification, transactions,restricted access and/or conditional access, such as described herein.The special properties 1802 may also be associated with a service orfunction, such as the services described above with FIG. 4, thatinterpret the properties to render or process syndicated content. Incertain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 18 may be data feeds, such asdata feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding current standards of clinical care, accreditationstandards, and the like obtained through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSSstream, or RSS channel. In embodiments syndicated data regarding currentstandards of clinical care, accreditation standards, and the like may beplotted, displayed, analyzed, or the like and distributed to anRSS-enabled client. The data may also, or instead be published in anunprocessed form for subsequent analysis and display using a client-sideapplication.

In embodiments, syndicated data regarding current standards of clinicalcare, accreditation standards, and the like may be associated with anapplication 406 consisting of a client-side program. The client-sideprogram may be adapted to operate on client devices such as, a desktopcomputer, laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like, and may provide device-specific rendering ofsyndicated content.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding current standards of clinicalcare, accreditation standards, and the like may be associated with anaggregator 210 to track updates, or otherwise combine, filter, orcluster feeds in any suitable manner for republication. For example, amedical specialty organization may wish to provide updates to itsmembers of clinical best practices or clinical care guidelines.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding current standards of clinicalcare, accreditation standards, and the like may be associated with acontent management system that may provide summaries of the syndicateddata available, dates associated with the syndicated data, links toaccess the full, non-summarized data, and the like. The contentmanagement system may be deployed within an enhanced syndication systemas described above. Standards of clinical care, for example, may beinformed by state court case law decisions in medical malpractice caseswhere the standard of care for a particular medical service was atissue. A state or national medical practice organization (e.g., theMassachusetts Medical Society) may provide syndicated data pertaining tostandards of clinical care with links to access the court cases orsummaries thereof that are relevant to particular standards.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding current standards of clinical care, accreditationstandards, and the like through the use of an application 406 providingsocial networking. In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interactwith syndicated data regarding current standards of clinical care,accreditation standards, and the like through the use of an application406 providing a user interface 700 for viewing data, records, and thelike. For example, a client 102 may, in response to user input such asclicking on a title of an item in the user interface 700, retrieve theunderlying item from the content source 204 as indicated by an arrow208. A social networking infrastructure may be used for example, totrack preferences with respect to alternative treatment methods, toprovide user communities according to treatment preferences, or evaluateand communicate trends towards and away from alternative protocols.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding current standards of clinical care, accreditationstandards, and the like through the use of an application 406 associatedwith a media viewer or directly through a media viewer. For example, anRSS item may refer to an image source, such as an MRI image in a medicalrecord from a hospital, and may specify a viewer for the source imagethat is available through the registry. In operation, a client (e.g. aphysician) with appropriate permissions to view the image (also asmanaged, e.g., through the metadata for the enhanced syndicationsystem), may retrieve the appropriate viewer service from the registry,and apply the viewer to view the source image.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding current standards of clinical care, accreditationstandards, and the like through the use of an application 406 providingvertical market integration. Clinical best practices, as circulated by amedical specialty organization, for example. may inform the practice ofindividual physicians, and may also be reviewed and integrated intoinstitutional best practices. A best clinical practice in anesthesiologyrequiring continuous monitoring of blood oxygen levels may also guidehospital purchasing decisions about acquiring a sufficient number ofpulse oximeters for all preoperative, intraoperative and postoperativepatients.

Referring again to FIG. 13, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated information related to healthcare standards as describedherein. The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network110 or may originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202or directly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or throughan application/interface/other 1308. The users 1304 may also interactwith each other. The application/interface/other 1308 may be aclient-side program, such as the healthcare program discussed herein, asocial networking application, a user interface, such as user interface700, 800 and/or 900, an application in connection with a media viewer, amedia viewer and/or an application providing for vertical marketintegration, such as described herein. The application/interface/other1308 may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 13may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding current standards of clinical care, accreditationstandards, and the like that is associated with database functions thatmay permit the data quality to be verified, provide for transformationof the data, enable searching, filtering, or clustering the patientdata, or categorizing the data into hierarchies, interrelationships,interrelated groups, and the like. A physician within a healthcareinstitution may use such database functions to search for a standard ofcare or clinical best practice for an unfamiliar disease, for example.As another example, she may search for a cluster standard of carepertaining to a multifaceted disease process like diabetes.

Referring again to FIG. 14, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated information related to healthcare standards as describedherein. The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network110 or may originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202or directly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through adatabase function 1402. The database function 1402 may also interactdirectly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 mayalso interact with each other. The database function 1402 may be adatabase function as described herein, such as related to data quality,data transformation, searching, filtering, clustering, a search engine,information relationships, hierarchical relationships andcategorization, such as described herein. The database function 1402may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 14may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding current standards of clinical care, accreditationstandards, and the like using semantic rules 412 that enable thecreation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadataenrichment of aggregated data, interpretation or translation ofaggregated data, as well as permit the creation of knowledge structures(e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like.

Referring again to FIG. 15, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated information related to healthcare standards as describedherein. The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network110 or may originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202or directly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through asemantic facility 1502. The semantic facility 1502 may also interactdirectly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 mayalso interact with each other. The semantic facility 1502 may provide orbe related to semantic rules, metadata creation, metadata enrichment,interpretation of aggregated data, such as syndicated data/information1302, translation of aggregated data, such as syndicateddata/information 1302, creation of knowledge structures, a dictionaryand/or a thesaurus, such as described herein. The semantic facility 1502may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 15may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may publish and/or subscribe toand/or interact with syndicated data regarding current standards ofclinical care, accreditation standards, and the like to which others maysubscribe and/or publish and/or with which others may interact. Dataregarding accreditation standards or standards of clinical care areadvantageously made available to a number of decentralized subscribers,for example. As another example, a number of institutions or individualsmay publish disclosures of specific illustrations of clinical bestpractices to fill out a specialty organization's set of guidelines.

In embodiments, the syndicated data regarding current standards ofclinical care, accreditation standards, and the like may be furtherassociated with information that may provide for the management of thedata. For example, the aggregated data may list the author of theaggregated data, the date on which it was authored, etc. Thus, the datamay provide for further aggregation, republication, and the like. In theexamples above, authorship information may identify the source ofclinical best practice illustrations so that the specialty organizationresponsible for the overall guidelines may determine the weight to beaccorded to any individual contribution.

Referring again to FIG. 16, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated information related to healthcare standards as describedherein. The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network110 or may originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202or directly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through asyndication facility 1602. The syndication facility 1602 may alsointeract directly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users1304 may also interact with each other. The syndication facility 1602may publish, subscribe to, aggregate and republish aggregated data, suchas syndicated data/information 1302, such as described herein. Thesyndication facility 1602 may also manage syndication information 1302,such as described herein. The syndication facility 1602 may, forexample, be deployed as a service in a services oriented architecture orusing the other techniques described above with reference to FIGS. 4 and5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 16 may be data feeds, suchas data feed 202. A user 1304 may also publish, republish and/orsubscribe to a content source 204, data feed 202, aggregator 210 and/orsyndication facility 1602.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding current standards of clinical care, accreditationstandards, and the like within an infrastructure 416 that provides fordata security, authentication, management of the traffic created by theRSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging andpinging technology, and/or other communications. Thus, for example,certain data within feeds may be encrypted to restrict access. Asanother example, access to a feed may be logged to obtain usage dataincluding the popularity of feeds and user data (e.g., by identity,role, affiliation, and so forth).

Referring again to FIG. 17, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated information related to healthcare standards as describedherein. The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network110 or may originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202or directly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or throughan infrastructure 1702. The infrastructure 1702 may also interactdirectly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 mayalso interact with each other. The infrastructure 1702 may provide or berelated to security, authentication, traffic management, logging,pinging and/or communications, such as described herein. Theinfrastructure 1702 may, for example, be deployed as a service in aservices oriented architecture or using the other techniques describedabove with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrowsof FIG. 17 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding current standards of clinical care, accreditationstandards, and the like that is associated with special formattingand/or display properties. In embodiments, healthcare institutions mayinteract with syndicated data regarding current standards of clinicalcare, accreditation standards, and the like that is associated withspecial identification and/or de-identification properties. In oneaspect, this may provide anonymity to patients with respect to patientdata, or anonymity to users who are accessing syndicated data. Inanother aspect, this may ensure the identification of a source or userof syndicated data when required, such as for audit purposes, or toinform a patient of a new diagnosis or possible diagnosis suggested by arecently updated standard of clinical care.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding current standards of clinical care, accreditationstandards, and the like, that is associated with properties allowing fortransactional processing. The transactions may be financialtransactions, such as related to medical reimbursement and/orsubscription fees or other charges for access to the syndicatedevidence-based information. In embodiments, healthcare institutions mayinteract with syndicated data regarding current standards of clinicalcare, accreditation standards, and the like that is associated withrestricted or conditional access properties. A medical specialtyorganization may provide syndicated standard of care information only toits members, for example, or only to that subset of members who havepaid a subscription fee.

Referring again to FIG. 18, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated information related to healthcare standards as describedherein. The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network110 or may originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202or directly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Theinfrastructure 1702 may also interact directly with the syndicateddata/information 1302. The users 1304 may also interact with each other.The syndicated data/information 1302 may be associated with specialproperties 1802. The special properties 1802 may be related toformatting, display, identification, de-identification, transactions,restricted access and/or conditional access, such as described herein.The special properties 1802 may also be provided by an architecture suchas that described above with reference to FIG. 4. In certain embodimentsthe arrows of FIG. 18 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical practice guidelines, clinical recommendations,clinical discussions, clinical analyses, and the like obtained throughan RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel. In embodimentssyndicated data regarding clinical practice guidelines, clinicalrecommendations, clinical discussions, clinical analyses, and the likemay be plotted, displayed, analyzed, or the like and distributed to anRSS-enabled client.

In embodiments, syndicated data regarding clinical practice guidelines,clinical recommendations, clinical discussions, clinical analyses, andthe like may be associated with an application 406 consisting of aclient-side program. The client-side program may be formatted to operateon client devices such as, a desktop computer, laptop computer, “pocket”personal computer, a cellular phone, Blackberry, personal digitalassistant, or other SMS text-enabled device, or the like. Such aclient-side program and device may permit, for example, thedissemination of clinical information to practitioners in aneasy-to-access format. Such a client-side device and program may furtherpermit practitioners to interact with their colleagues about clinicalissues, in a format resembling “live chat.”

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding clinical practice guidelines,clinical recommendations, clinical discussions, clinical analyses, andthe like may be associated with an aggregator 210 to track updates. Sucha system may permit practitioners to access updated information about aparticular condition when such information becomes available. Apractitioner may subscribe to syndicated data relating, for example, toa clinical condition (e.g., breast cancer), a treatment regimen (e.g.,estrogen receptor blockers), or an area of scientific investigation(e.g., genetics of cancer), or an aspect of health care policy (e.g.,reimbursement for experimental procedures). Such updates may enhanceclinical practice by ensuring that a physician has access to the mostcurrent information.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding clinical practice guidelines,clinical recommendations, clinical discussions, clinical analyses, andthe like may be associated with a content management system that mayprovide summaries of the syndicated data available, dates associatedwith the syndicated data, links to access the full, non-summarized data,and the like. A practitioner subscribing to syndicated data about“What's New in Breast Cancer,” for example, may receive summaries of therelevant information, accompanied by links to abstracts, full reports ornews articles so that he can obtain further information about thoseitems that interest him.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical practice guidelines, clinical recommendations,clinical discussions, clinical analyses, and the like through the use ofan application 406 providing social networking. For example, throughsocial networking an institution may be able to communicate and sharesyndicated data with other healthcare institutions with whom theinstitution shares patient populations, clinical specialties, clinicalpopulation types, and the like. Metadata within syndicated messages may,for example, identify groups, practice areas, or the like to which themessage relates. The clinical factors of relevance to institutions thatseek to share syndicated data may be expressed in detailed tags thatprovide narrowly tailored or easily filterable RSS feeds 202, web feeds,RSS streams, or RSS channels for ongoing data sharing. Such a processmay allow institutions who care for similar patient populations toaggregate data for more robust analysis.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical practice guidelines, clinical recommendations,clinical discussions, clinical analyses, and the like through the use ofan application 406 providing a user interface 700 for viewing data,records, and the like. For example, a client 102 may, in response touser input such as clicking on a title of an item in the user interface700, retrieve the underlying item from the content source 204 asindicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical practice guidelines, clinical recommendations,clinical discussions, clinical analyses, and the like through the use ofan application 406 associated with a media viewer or directly through amedia viewer. For example, an RSS item may refer to an image source,such as an MRI image in a medical record from a hospital, and mayspecify a viewer for the source image that is available through theregistry. In operation, a client (e.g. a physician) with appropriatepermissions to view the image (also as managed, e.g., through themetadata for the enhanced syndication system), may retrieve theappropriate viewer service from the registry, and apply the viewer toview the source image.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical practice guidelines, clinical recommendations,clinical discussions, clinical analyses, and the like through the use ofan application 406 providing vertical market integration. A clinicalrecommendation that all women over 40 receive annual mammograms impactsindividual physicians and their offices, for example, and also becomesrelevant to radiologists and their offices, the facilities that housethe mammography equipment, and the purchasers who make decisions aboutobtaining additional mammogram machines.

Referring again to FIG. 13, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated clinical information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through anapplication/interface/other 1308. The users 1304 may also interact witheach other. The application/interface/other 1308 may be a client-sideprogram, such as the healthcare program discussed herein, a socialnetworking application, a user interface, such as user interface 700,800 and/or 900, an application in connection with a media viewer, amedia viewer and/or an application providing for vertical marketintegration, such as described herein. The application/interface/other1308 may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 13may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical practice guidelines, clinical recommendations,clinical discussions, clinical analyses, and the like that is associatedwith database functions that may permit the data quality to be verified,provide for transformation of the data, enable searching, filtering, orclustering the patient data, or categorizing the data into hierarchies,interrelationships, interrelated groups, and the like. A physician mayuse such database functions, for example, in obtaining syndicated dataregarding an unfamiliar disease or a multifaceted one like diabetes orhypertension. Database functions in these exemplary situations may allowfor obtaining data about aspects of an unfamiliar disease through searchfunctions, or may allow for obtaining information about the manyclinical issues that treating a complex disease like diabetes mayinvolve.

Referring again to FIG. 14, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated clinical information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a databasefunction 1402. The database function 1402 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The database function 1402 may be a databasefunction as described herein, such as related to data quality, datatransformation, searching, filtering, clustering, a search engine,information relationships, hierarchical relationships andcategorization, such as described herein. The database function 1402may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 14may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical practice guidelines, clinical recommendations,clinical discussions, clinical analyses, and the like that is associatedwith semantic rules 412 that enable the creation of metadata. Semanticrules 412 may also provide for metadata enrichment of aggregated data,interpretation or translation of aggregated data, as well as permit thecreation of knowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of adictionary, thesaurus or the like. Semantic rules may permit apractitioner, for example, to access results from all published clinicaltrials for a particular product.

Referring again to FIG. 15, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated clinical information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a semanticfacility 1502. The semantic facility 1502 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The semantic facility 1502 may provide or berelated to semantic rules, metadata creation, metadata enrichment,interpretation of aggregated data, such as syndicated data/information1302, translation of aggregated data, such as syndicateddata/information 1302, creation of knowledge structures, a dictionaryand/or a thesaurus, such as described herein. The semantic facility 1502may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 15may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may publish and/or subscribe toand/or interact with syndicated data regarding clinical practiceguidelines, clinical recommendations, clinical discussions, clinicalanalyses, and the like to which others may subscribe and/or publishand/or with which others may interact. Such syndicated data may beparticularly attractive to practitioners, for example, who wish to keepabreast of new developments in a practice area.

In embodiments, the syndicated data regarding clinical practiceguidelines, clinical recommendations, clinical discussions, clinicalanalyses, and the like may be further associated with information thatmay provide for the management of the data. For example, the aggregateddata may list the author of the aggregated data, the date on which itwas authored, etc. Thus, the data may provide for further aggregation,republication, and the like. A health care institution, for example ateaching hospital, may publish all of its grand rounds in all itsmedical specialties and make this information available as syndicateddata, for example, “Hospital Grand Rounds This Week.” These data may bereaggregated and republished by a CME organization on aspecialty-by-specialty basis, along with similar data from otherinstitutions. Such a republication may provide, for example, “WeeklyGrand Rounds in Urology,” that contains syndicated data derived from theurology grand rounds presented at a number of health care institutions.A practicing urologist may wish to subscribe only to “Weekly GrandRounds in Urology,” as has been reaggregated and republished, while afamily practitioner in the community may wish to subscribe to theoriginal syndicated data<“Hospital Grand Rounds This Week,” representingthe teaching hospital's entire repertoire of grand rounds in everyspecialty for the week.

Referring again to FIG. 16, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated clinical information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a syndicationfacility 1602. The syndication facility 1602 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The syndication facility 1602 may publish,subscribe to, aggregate and republish aggregated data, such assyndicated data/information 1302, such as described herein. Thesyndication facility 1602 may also manage syndication information 1302,such as described herein. The syndication facility 1602 may, forexample, be deployed as a service in a services oriented architecture orusing the other techniques described above with reference to FIGS. 4 and5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 16 may be data feeds, suchas data feed 202. A user 1304 may also publish, republish and/orsubscribe to a content source 204, data feed 202, aggregator 210 and/orsyndication facility 1602.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical practice guidelines, clinical recommendations,clinical discussions, clinical analyses, and the like within aninfrastructure 416 that provides for data security, authentication,management of the traffic created by the RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSSstreams, or RSS channels, logging and pinging technology, and/or othercommunications.

Referring again to FIG. 17, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated clinical information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through aninfrastructure 1702. The infrastructure 1702 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The infrastructure 1702 may provide or berelated to security, authentication, traffic management, logging,pinging and/or communications, such as described herein. Theinfrastructure 1702 may, for example, be deployed as a service in aservices oriented architecture or using the other techniques describedabove with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrowsof FIG. 17 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical practice guidelines, clinical recommendations,clinical discussions, clinical analyses, and the like that is associatedwith special formatting and/or display properties. In embodiments,healthcare institutions may interact with syndicated data regardingclinical practice guidelines, clinical recommendations, clinicaldiscussions, clinical analyses, and the like that is associated withspecial identification and/or de-identification properties. Individualsparticipating in clinical discussions, for example, may wish to remainanonymous.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical practice guidelines, clinical recommendations,clinical discussions, clinical analyses, and the like, that isassociated with properties allowing for transactional processing. Thetransactions may be financial transactions, such as related to medicalreimbursement and/or subscription fees or other charges for access tothe syndicated evidence-based information.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical practice guidelines, clinical recommendations,clinical discussions, clinical analyses, and the like that is associatedwith restricted or conditional access properties. Individualsparticipating in clinical discussions, for example, may need to offercredentials indicating that they are licensed physicians.

Referring again to FIG. 18, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated clinical information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. The infrastructure1702 may also interact directly with the syndicated data/information1302. The users 1304 may also interact with each other. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may be associated with special properties 1802.The special properties 1802 may be related to formatting, display,identification, de-identification, transactions, restricted accessand/or conditional access, such as described herein. In certainembodiments the arrows of FIG. 18 may be data feeds, such as data feed202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical processes, clinical interventions, clinicaloutcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are part of a qualityimprovement program, such as total quality management, continuousquality improvement, or the like obtained through an RSS feed 202, webfeed, RSS stream, or RSS channel.

In embodiments syndicated data regarding clinical processes, clinicalinterventions, clinical outcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are partof a quality improvement program, such as total quality management,continuous quality improvement, or the like may be plotted, displayed,analyzed, or the like and distributed to an RSS-enabled client. Thesyndicated data may also, or instead contain tags and/or metadata toassist client-side analysis and display.

In embodiments, syndicated data regarding clinical processes, clinicalinterventions, clinical outcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are partof a quality improvement program, such as total quality management,continuous quality improvement, or the like may be associated with anapplication 406 consisting of a client-side program. The client-sideprogram may be formatted to operate on client devices such as, a desktopcomputer, laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding clinical processes, clinicalinterventions, clinical outcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are partof a quality improvement program, such as total quality management,continuous quality improvement, or the like may be associated with anaggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding clinical processes, clinicalinterventions, clinical outcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are partof a quality improvement program, such as total quality management,continuous quality improvement, or the like may be associated with acontent management system that may provide summaries of the syndicateddata available, dates associated with the syndicated data, links toaccess the full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical processes, clinical interventions, clinicaloutcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are part of a qualityimprovement program, such as total quality management, continuousquality improvement, or the like through the use of an application 406providing social networking. For example, through social networking aninstitution may be able to communicate and share syndicated data withother healthcare institutions with whom the institution shares patientpopulations, clinical specialties, clinical population types, and thelike. Syndicated content may be filtered or aggregated with othersyndicated content according to characteristics of various usercommunities and groups. The clinical factors of relevance toinstitutions who seek to share syndicated data may be enhanced withdetailed tags to provide narrowly tailored RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSSstreams, or RSS channels for ongoing data sharing, or to enableclient-side customization of the presentation of syndicated feeds. Sucha process may allow institutions who care for similar patientpopulations to aggregate and/or filter data for more robust analysis.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical processes, clinical interventions, clinicaloutcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are part of a qualityimprovement program, such as total quality management, continuousquality improvement, or the like through the use of an application 406providing a user interface 700 for viewing data, records, and the like.For example, a client 102 may, in response to user input such asclicking on a title of an item in the user interface 700, retrieve theunderlying item from the content source 204 as indicated by an arrow208. In one aspect, a feed may contain metadata with recommendations orrequirements for display in the user interface 700.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical processes, clinical interventions, clinicaloutcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are part of a qualityimprovement program, such as total quality management, continuousquality improvement, or the like through the use of an application 406associated with a media viewer or directly through a media viewer. Forexample, an RSS item may refer to an image source, such as an MRI imagein a medical record from a hospital, and may specify a viewer for thesource image that is available through the registry. In operation, aclient (e.g. a physician) with appropriate permissions to view the image(also as managed, e.g., through the metadata for the enhancedsyndication system), may retrieve the appropriate viewer service fromthe registry, and apply the viewer to view the source image.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical processes, clinical interventions, clinicaloutcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are part of a qualityimprovement program, such as total quality management, continuousquality improvement, or the like through the use of an application 406providing vertical market integration.

Referring again to FIG. 13, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated quality improvement information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through anapplication/interface/other 1308. The users 1304 may also interact witheach other. The application/interface/other 1308 may be a client-sideprogram, such as the healthcare program discussed herein, a socialnetworking application, a user interface, such as user interface 700,800 and/or 900, an application in connection with a media viewer, amedia viewer and/or an application providing for vertical marketintegration, such as described herein. The application/interface/other1308 may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 13may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical processes, clinical interventions, clinicaloutcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are part of a qualityimprovement program, such as total quality management, continuousquality improvement, or the like is associated with database functionsthat may permit the data quality to be verified, provide fortransformation of the data, enable searching, filtering, or clusteringthe patient data, or categorizing the data into hierarchies,interrelationships, interrelated groups, and the like.

Referring again to FIG. 14, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated quality improvement information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a databasefunction 1402. The database function 1402 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The database function 1402 may be a databasefunction as described herein, such as related to data quality, datatransformation, searching, filtering, clustering, a search engine,information relationships, hierarchical relationships andcategorization, such as described herein. The database function 1402may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 14may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical processes, clinical interventions, clinicaloutcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are part of a qualityimprovement program, such as total quality management, continuousquality improvement, or the like that is associated with semantic rules412 that enable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may alsoprovide for metadata enrichment of aggregated data, interpretation ortranslation of aggregated data, as well as permit the creation ofknowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary,thesaurus or the like.

Referring again to FIG. 15, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated quality improvement information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a semanticfacility 1502. The semantic facility 1502 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The semantic facility 1502 may provide or berelated to semantic rules, metadata creation, metadata enrichment,interpretation of aggregated data, such as syndicated data/information1302, translation of aggregated data, such as syndicateddata/information 1302, creation of knowledge structures, a dictionaryand/or a thesaurus, such as described herein. The semantic facility 1502may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 15may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may publish and/or subscribe toand/or interact with syndicated data regarding clinical processes,clinical interventions, clinical outcomes, clinical personnel, etc. thatare part of a quality improvement program, such as total qualitymanagement, continuous quality improvement, or the like to which othersmay subscribe and/or publish and/or with which others may interact.

In embodiments, the syndicated data regarding clinical processes,clinical interventions, clinical outcomes, clinical personnel, etc. thatare part of a quality improvement program, such as total qualitymanagement, continuous quality improvement, or the like may be furtherassociated with information that may provide for the management of thedata. For example, the aggregated data may list the author of theaggregated data, the date on which it was authored, etc. Thus, the datamay provide for further aggregation, republication, and the like.

Referring again to FIG. 16, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated quality improvement information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through asyndication facility 1602. The syndication facility 1602 may alsointeract directly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users1304 may also interact with each other. The syndication facility 1602may publish, subscribe to, aggregate and republish aggregated data, suchas syndicated data/information 1302, such as described herein. Thesyndication facility 1602 may also manage syndication information 1302,such as described herein. The syndication facility 1602 may, forexample, be deployed as a service in a services oriented architecture orusing the other techniques described above with reference to FIGS. 4 and5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 16 may be data feeds, suchas data feed 202. A user 1304 may also publish, republish and/orsubscribe to a content source 204, data feed 202, aggregator 210 and/orsyndication facility 1602.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical processes, clinical interventions, clinicaloutcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are part of a qualityimprovement program, such as total quality management, continuousquality improvement, or the like within an infrastructure 416 thatprovides for data security, authentication, management of the trafficcreated by the RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels,logging and pinging technology, and/or other communications.

Referring again to FIG. 17, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated quality improvement information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through aninfrastructure 1702. The infrastructure 1702 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The infrastructure 1702 may provide or berelated to security, authentication, traffic management, logging,pinging and/or communications, such as described herein. Theinfrastructure 1702 may, for example, be deployed as a service in aservices oriented architecture or using the other techniques describedabove with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrowsof FIG. 17 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical processes, clinical interventions, clinicaloutcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are part of a qualityimprovement program, such as total quality management, continuousquality improvement, or the like that is associated with specialformatting and/or display properties.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical processes, clinical interventions, clinicaloutcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are part of a qualityimprovement program, such as total quality management, continuousquality improvement, or the like that is associated with specialidentification and/or de-identification properties.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical processes, clinical interventions, clinicaloutcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are part of a qualityimprovement program, such as total quality management, continuousquality improvement, or the like, that is associated with propertiesallowing for transactional processing. The transactions may be financialtransactions, such as related to medical reimbursement and/orsubscription fees or other charges for access to the syndicatedevidence-based information.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding clinical processes, clinical interventions, clinicaloutcomes, clinical personnel, etc. that are part of a qualityimprovement program, such as total quality management, continuousquality improvement, or the like that is associated with restricted orconditional access properties.

Referring again to FIG. 18, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated quality improvement information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. The infrastructure1702 may also interact directly with the syndicated data/information1302. The users 1304 may also interact with each other. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may be associated with special properties 1802.The special properties 1802 may be related to formatting, display,identification, de-identification, transactions, restricted accessand/or conditional access, such as described herein. The specialproperties 1802 may also be associated with a service application 406,408, 410, 412, 414 and/or 416. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG.18 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' training history, currentcredentials, continuing medical education credits, training needs,planned training and the like obtained through an RSS feed 202, webfeed, RSS stream, or RSS channel. Present systems may depend onproviders submitting documentation of their training history,credentials and CME. Making this information available in a syndicatedformat may streamline the quality review process that an institutionundertakes for any particular provider.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' training history, currentcredentials, continuing medical education credits, training needs,planned training and the like may be plotted, displayed, analyzed, orthe like and distributed to an RSS-enabled client.

In embodiments, syndicated data regarding its healthcare providers'training history, current credentials, continuing medical educationcredits, training needs, planned training and the like may be associatedwith an application 406 consisting of a client-side program. Theclient-side program may be formatted to operate on client devices suchas, a desktop computer, laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, acellular phone, Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMStext-enabled device, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding its healthcare providers'training history, current credentials, continuing medical educationcredits, training needs, planned training and the like may be associatedwith an aggregator 210 to track updates. In this way, for example, aninstitution may monitor the progress an individual physician is makingtowards satisfying the CME requirements that pertain to medicalrelicensure.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding its healthcare providers'training history, current credentials, continuing medical educationcredits, training needs, planned training and the like may be associatedwith a content management system that may provide summaries of thesyndicated data available, dates associated with the syndicated data,links to access the full, non-summarized data, and the like. Forexample, an institution may access further information about a CMEprogram that a practitioner has completed to keep track of specialcompetencies that individual practitioners are maintaining. A hospitalgranting an individual operating room privileges for craniofacialsurgery may check that individual's training program and CME submissionsto be sure that the training program and CME updates are consistent withthe scope of surgical privileges granted.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' training history, currentcredentials, continuing medical education credits, training needs,planned training and the like through the use of an application 406providing social networking. Within an academic department at a medicalcenter, for example, individual physicians may share materials orinformation from their continuing medical education. As another example,review of such materials may allow medical departments to plan futureCME exercises.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' training history, currentcredentials, continuing medical education credits, training needs,planned training and the like through the use of an application 406providing a user interface 700 for viewing data, records, and the like.For example, a client 102 may, in response to user input such asclicking on a title of an item in the user interface 700, retrieve theunderlying item from the content source 204 as indicated by an arrow208.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' training history, currentcredentials, continuing medical education credits, training needs,planned training and the like through the use of an application 406associated with a media viewer or directly through a media viewer. Forexample, an RSS item may refer to an image source, such as an MRI imagein a medical record from a hospital, and may specify a viewer for thesource image that is available through the registry. In operation, aclient (e.g. a physician) with appropriate permissions to view the image(also as managed, e.g., through the metadata for the enhancedsyndication system), may retrieve the appropriate viewer service fromthe registry, and apply the viewer to view the source image.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' training history, currentcredentials, continuing medical education credits, training needs,planned training and the like through the use of an application 406providing vertical market integration. The individual physician and herpractice may keep track of credentials and CME, for example, and thehospital may keep track of the same information. Such syndicated datamay also be used by the hospital marketing department to identifyindividuals with particular skills that should be publicized.

Referring again to FIG. 13, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated training and qualification information as described herein.The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 ormay originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 ordirectly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or throughan application/interface/other 1308. The users 1304 may also interactwith each other. The application/interface/other 1308 may be aclient-side program, such as the healthcare program discussed herein, asocial networking application, a user interface, such as user interface700, 800 and/or 900, an application in connection with a media viewer, amedia viewer and/or an application providing for vertical marketintegration, such as described herein. The application/interface/other1308 may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 13may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' training history, currentcredentials, continuing medical education credits, training needs,planned training and the like that is associated with database functionsthat may permit the data quality to be verified, provide fortransformation of the data, enable searching, filtering, or clusteringthe patient data, or categorizing the data into hierarchies,interrelationships, interrelated groups, and the like.

Referring again to FIG. 14, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated training and qualification information as described herein.The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 ormay originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 ordirectly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through adatabase function 1402. The database function 1402 may also interactdirectly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 mayalso interact with each other. The database function 1402 may be adatabase function as described herein, such as related to data quality,data transformation, searching, filtering, clustering, a search engine,information relationships, hierarchical relationships andcategorization, such as described herein. The database function 1402may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 14may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' training history, currentcredentials, continuing medical education credits, training needs,planned training and the like that is associated with semantic rules 412that enable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may alsoprovide for metadata enrichment of aggregated data, interpretation ortranslation of aggregated data, as well as permit the creation ofknowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary,thesaurus or the like.

Referring again to FIG. 15, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated training and qualification information as described herein.The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 ormay originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 ordirectly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through asemantic facility 1502. The semantic facility 1502 may also interactdirectly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 mayalso interact with each other. The semantic facility 1502 may provide orbe related to semantic rules, metadata creation, metadata enrichment,interpretation of aggregated data, such as syndicated data/information1302, translation of aggregated data, such as syndicateddata/information 1302, creation of knowledge structures, a dictionaryand/or a thesaurus, such as described herein. The semantic facility 1502may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 15may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may publish and/or subscribe toand/or interact with syndicated data regarding its healthcare providers'training history, current credentials, continuing medical educationcredits, training needs, planned training and the like to which othersmay subscribe and/or publish and/or with which others may interact.

In embodiments, the syndicated data regarding its healthcare providers'training history, current credentials, continuing medical educationcredits, training needs, planned training and the like may be furtherassociated with information that may provide for the management of thedata. For example, the aggregated data may list the author of theaggregated data, the date on which it was authored, etc. Thus, the datamay provide for further aggregation, republication, and the like.

Referring again to FIG. 16, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated training and qualification information as described herein.The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 ormay originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 ordirectly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through asyndication facility 1602. The syndication facility 1602 may alsointeract directly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users1304 may also interact with each other. The syndication facility 1602may publish, subscribe to, aggregate and republish aggregated data, suchas syndicated data/information 1302, such as described herein. Thesyndication facility 1602 may also manage syndication information 1302,such as described herein. The syndication facility 1602 may, forexample, be deployed as a service in a services oriented architecture orusing the other techniques described above with reference to FIGS. 4 and5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 16 may be data feeds, suchas data feed 202. A user 1304 may also publish, republish and/orsubscribe to a content source 204, data feed 202, aggregator 210 and/orsyndication facility 1602.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' training history, currentcredentials, continuing medical education credits, training needs,planned training and the like within an infrastructure 416 that providesfor data security, authentication, management of the traffic created bythe RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging andpinging technology, and/or other communications.

Referring again to FIG. 17, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated training and qualification information as described herein.The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 ormay originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 ordirectly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/orinteract with the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or throughan infrastructure 1702. The infrastructure 1702 may also interactdirectly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 mayalso interact with each other. The infrastructure 1702 may provide or berelated to security, authentication, traffic management, logging,pinging and/or communications, such as described herein. Theinfrastructure 1702 may, for example, be deployed as a service in aservices oriented architecture or using the other techniques describedabove with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrowsof FIG. 17 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' training history, currentcredentials, continuing medical education credits, training needs,planned training and the like that is associated with special formattingand/or display properties.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' training history, currentcredentials, continuing medical education credits, training needs,planned training and the like that is associated with specialidentification and/or de-identification properties.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' training history, currentcredentials, continuing medical education credits, training needs,planned training and the like, that is associated with propertiesallowing for transactional processing. The transactions may be financialtransactions, such as related to medical reimbursement and/orsubscription fees or other charges for access to the syndicatedevidence-based information.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' training history, currentcredentials, continuing medical education credits, training needs,planned training and the like that is associated with restricted orconditional access properties.

Referring again to FIG. 18, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated training and qualification information as described herein.The syndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 ormay originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 ordirectly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Theinfrastructure 1702 may also interact directly with the syndicateddata/information 1302. The users 1304 may also interact with each other.The syndicated data/information 1302 may be associated with specialproperties 1802. The special properties 1802 may be related toformatting, display, identification, de-identification, transactions,restricted access and/or conditional access, such as described herein.The special properties 1802 may also be associated with a serviceapplication 406, 408, 410, 412, 414 and/or 416. In certain embodimentsthe arrows of FIG. 18 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' performance, errors, clinicaloutcomes, resource use, referral patterns, billing history, malpracticehistory, and the like obtained through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSSstream, or RSS channel.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' performance, errors, clinicaloutcomes, resource use, referral patterns, billing history, malpracticehistory, and the like may be plotted, displayed, analyzed, or the likeand distributed to an RSS-enabled client.

In embodiments, syndicated data regarding its healthcare providers'performance, errors, clinical outcomes, resource use, referral patterns,billing history, malpractice history, and the like may be associatedwith an application 406 consisting of a client-side program. Theclient-side program may be formatted to operate on client devices suchas, a desktop computer, laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, acellular phone, Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMStext-enabled device, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding its healthcare providers'performance, errors, clinical outcomes, resource use, referral patterns,billing history, malpractice history, and the like may be associatedwith an aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding its healthcare providers'performance, errors, clinical outcomes, resource use, referral patterns,billing history, malpractice history, and the like may be associatedwith a content management system that may provide summaries of thesyndicated data available, dates associated with the syndicated data,links to access the full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' performance, errors, clinicaloutcomes, resource use, referral patterns, billing history, malpracticehistory, and the like through the use of an application 406 providingsocial networking. For example, through social networking an institutionmay be able to communicate and share syndicated data with otherhealthcare institutions with whom the institution shares patientpopulations, clinical specialties, clinical population types, and thelike. The clinical factors of relevance to institutions that seek toshare syndicated data may be published with detailed tags to providenarrowly tailored or easily filtered RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSSstreams, or RSS channels for ongoing data sharing. Such a process mayallow institutions who care for similar patient populations to aggregatedata for more robust analysis.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' performance, errors, clinicaloutcomes, resource use, referral patterns, billing history, malpracticehistory, and the like through the use of an application 406 providing auser interface 700 for viewing data, records, and the like. For example,a client 102 may, in response to user input such as clicking on a titleof an item in the user interface 700, retrieve the underlying item fromthe content source 204 as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' performance, errors, clinicaloutcomes, resource use, referral patterns, billing history, malpracticehistory, and the like through the use of an application 406 associatedwith a media viewer or directly through a media viewer. For example, anRSS item may refer to an image source, such as an MRI image in a medicalrecord from a hospital, and may specify a viewer for the source imagethat is available through the registry. In operation, a client (e.g. aphysician) with appropriate permissions to view the image (also asmanaged, e.g., through the metadata for the enhanced syndicationsystem), may retrieve the appropriate viewer service from the registry,and apply the viewer to view the source image.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' performance, errors, clinicaloutcomes, resource use, referral patterns, billing history, malpracticehistory, and the like through the use of an application 406 providingvertical market integration.

Referring again to FIG. 13, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated performance information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through anapplication/interface/other 1308. The users 1304 may also interact witheach other. The application/interface/other 1308 may be a client-sideprogram, such as the healthcare program discussed herein, a socialnetworking application, a user interface, such as user interface 700,800 and/or 900, an application in connection with a media viewer, amedia viewer and/or an application providing for vertical marketintegration, such as described herein. The application/interface/other1308 may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 13may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' performance, errors, clinicaloutcomes, resource use, referral patterns, billing history, malpracticehistory, and the like that is associated with database functions thatmay permit the data quality to be verified, provide for transformationof the data, enable searching, filtering, or clustering the patientdata, or categorizing the data into hierarchies, interrelationships,interrelated groups, and the like.

Referring again to FIG. 14, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated performance information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a databasefunction 1402. The database function 1402 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The database function 1402 may be a databasefunction as described herein, such as related to data quality, datatransformation, searching, filtering, clustering, a search engine,information relationships, hierarchical relationships andcategorization, such as described herein. The database function 1402may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 14may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' performance, errors, clinicaloutcomes, resource use, referral patterns, billing history, malpracticehistory, and the like that is associated with semantic rules 412 thatenable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide formetadata enrichment of aggregated data, interpretation or translation ofaggregated data, as well as permit the creation of knowledge structures(e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like.

Referring again to FIG. 15, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated performance information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a semanticfacility 1502. The semantic facility 1502 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The semantic facility 1502 may provide or berelated to semantic rules, metadata creation, metadata enrichment,interpretation of aggregated data, such as syndicated data/information1302, translation of aggregated data, such as syndicateddata/information 1302, creation of knowledge structures, a dictionaryand/or a thesaurus, such as described herein. The semantic facility 1502may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 15may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may publish and/or subscribe toand/or interact with syndicated data regarding its healthcare providers'performance, errors, clinical outcomes, resource use, referral patterns,billing history, malpractice history, and the like to which others maysubscribe and/or publish and/or with which others may interact.

In embodiments, the syndicated data regarding its healthcare providers'performance, errors, clinical outcomes, resource use, referral patterns,billing history, malpractice history, and the like may be furtherassociated with information that may provide for the management of thedata. For example, the aggregated data may list the author of theaggregated data, the date on which it was authored, etc. Thus, the datamay provide for further aggregation, republication, and the like.

Referring again to FIG. 16, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated performance information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a syndicationfacility 1602. The syndication facility 1602 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The syndication facility 1602 may publish,subscribe to, aggregate and republish aggregated data, such assyndicated data/information 1302, such as described herein. Thesyndication facility 1602 may also manage syndication information 1302,such as described herein. The syndication facility 1602 may, forexample, be deployed as a service in a services oriented architecture orusing the other techniques described above with reference to FIGS. 4 and5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 16 may be data feeds, suchas data feed 202. A user 1304 may also publish, republish and/orsubscribe to a content source 204, data feed 202, aggregator 210 and/orsyndication facility 1602.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' performance, errors, clinicaloutcomes, resource use, referral patterns, billing history, malpracticehistory, and the like within an infrastructure 416 that provides fordata security, authentication, management of the traffic created by theRSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging andpinging technology, and/or other communications.

Referring again to FIG. 17, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated performance information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through aninfrastructure 1702. The infrastructure 1702 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The infrastructure 1702 may provide or berelated to security, authentication, traffic management, logging,pinging and/or communications, such as described herein. Theinfrastructure 1702 may, for example, be deployed as a service in aservices oriented architecture or using the other techniques describedabove with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrowsof FIG. 17 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' performance, errors, clinicaloutcomes, resource use, referral patterns, billing history, malpracticehistory, and the like that is associated with special formatting and/ordisplay properties.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' performance, errors, clinicaloutcomes, resource use, referral patterns, billing history, malpracticehistory, and the like that is associated with special identificationand/or de-identification properties. Within the health care setting, itmay not be possible to collect meaningful data regarding its healthcareproviders' performance, errors, clinical outcomes, resource use,referral patterns, billing history, malpractice history, and the like,for example, unless provisions are made for deidentifying it.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' performance, errors, clinicaloutcomes, resource use, referral patterns, billing history, malpracticehistory, and the like, that is associated with properties allowing fortransactional processing. The transactions may be financialtransactions, such as related to medical reimbursement and/orsubscription fees or other charges for access to the syndicatedevidence-based information.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its healthcare providers' performance, errors, clinicaloutcomes, resource use, referral patterns, billing history, malpracticehistory, and the like that is associated with restricted or conditionalaccess properties. Within the health care setting, for example,collection and distribution of meaningful syndicated data regarding itshealthcare providers' performance, errors, clinical outcomes, resourceuse, referral patterns, billing history, malpractice history, and thelike, may require that access to such data be restricted.

Referring again to FIG. 18, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated performance information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. The infrastructure1702 may also interact directly with the syndicated data/information1302. The users 1304 may also interact with each other. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may be associated with special properties 1802.The special properties 1802 may be related to formatting, display,identification, de-identification, transactions, restricted accessand/or conditional access, such as described herein. The specialproperties 1802 may also be associated with a service application 406,408, 410, 412, 414 and/or 416. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG.18 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its expenditures for patient care, such as office visits,admissions, outpatient care, medications, surgical interventions,resource utilization, etc. as part of cost-effectiveness research,cost-benefit analyses, and the like obtained through an RSS feed 202,web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its expenditures for patient care, such as office visits,admissions, outpatient care, medications, surgical interventions,resource utilization, etc. as part of cost-effectiveness research,cost-benefit analyses, and the like may be plotted, displayed, analyzed,or the like and distributed to an RSS-enabled client.

In embodiments, syndicated data regarding its expenditures for patientcare, such as office visits, admissions, outpatient care, medications,surgical interventions, resource utilization, etc. as part ofcost-effectiveness research, cost-benefit analyses, and the like may beassociated with an application 406 consisting of a client-side program.The client-side program may be formatted to operate on client devicessuch as, a desktop computer, laptop computer, “pocket” personalcomputer, a cellular phone, Blackberry, personal digital assistant, orother SMS text-enabled device, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding its expenditures for patientcare, such as office visits, admissions, outpatient care, medications,surgical interventions, resource utilization, etc. as part ofcost-effectiveness research, cost-benefit analyses, and the like may beassociated with an aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding its expenditures for patientcare, such as office visits, admissions, outpatient care, medications,surgical interventions, resource utilization, etc. as part ofcost-effectiveness research, cost-benefit analyses, and the like may beassociated with a content management system that may provide summariesof the syndicated data available, dates associated with the syndicateddata, links to access the full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its expenditures for patient care, such as office visits,admissions, outpatient care, medications, surgical interventions,resource utilization, etc. as part of cost-effectiveness research,cost-benefit analyses, and the like through the use of an application406 providing social networking. For example, through social networkingan institution may be able to communicate and share syndicated data withother healthcare institutions with whom the institution shares patientpopulations, clinical specialties, clinical population types, and thelike. The clinical factors of relevance to institutions that seek toshare syndicated data may be published with detailed tags to providenarrowly tailored or easily filtered RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSSstreams, or RSS channels for ongoing data sharing. Such a process mayallow institutions who care for similar patient populations to aggregatedata for more robust analysis.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its expenditures for patient care, such as office visits,admissions, outpatient care, medications, surgical interventions,resource utilization, etc. as part of cost-effectiveness research,cost-benefit analyses, and the like through the use of an application406 providing a user interface 700 for viewing data, records, and thelike. For example, a client 102 may, in response to user input such asclicking on a title of an item in the user interface 700, retrieve theunderlying item from the content source 204 as indicated by an arrow208.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its expenditures for patient care, such as office visits,admissions, outpatient care, medications, surgical interventions,resource utilization, etc. as part of cost-effectiveness research,cost-benefit analyses, and the like through the use of an application406 associated with a media viewer or directly through a media viewer.For example, an RSS item may refer to an image source, such as an MRIimage in a medical record from a hospital, and may specify a viewer forthe source image that is available through the registry. In operation, aclient (e.g. a physician) with appropriate permissions to view the image(also as managed, e.g., through the metadata for the enhancedsyndication system), may retrieve the appropriate viewer service fromthe registry, and apply the viewer to view the source image.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its expenditures for patient care, such as office visits,admissions, outpatient care, medications, surgical interventions,resource utilization, etc. as part of cost-effectiveness research,cost-benefit analyses, and the like through the use of an application406 providing vertical market integration.

Referring again to FIG. 13, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated expenditure information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through anapplication/interface/other 1308. The users 1304 may also interact witheach other. The application/interface/other 1308 may be a client-sideprogram, such as the healthcare program discussed herein, a socialnetworking application, a user interface, such as user interface 700,800 and/or 900, an application in connection with a media viewer, amedia viewer and/or an application providing for vertical marketintegration, such as described herein. The application/interface/other1308 may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 13may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its expenditures for patient care, such as office visits,admissions, outpatient care, medications, surgical interventions,resource utilization, etc. as part of cost-effectiveness research,cost-benefit analyses, and the like that is associated with databasefunctions that may permit the data quality to be verified, provide fortransformation of the data, enable searching, filtering, or clusteringthe patient data, or categorizing the data into hierarchies,interrelationships, interrelated groups, and the like.

Referring again to FIG. 14, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated expenditure information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a databasefunction 1402. The database function 1402 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The database function 1402 may be a databasefunction as described herein, such as related to data quality, datatransformation, searching, filtering, clustering, a search engine,information relationships, hierarchical relationships andcategorization, such as described herein. The database function 1402may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 14may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its expenditures for patient care, such as office visits,admissions, outpatient care, medications, surgical interventions,resource utilization, etc. as part of cost-effectiveness research,cost-benefit analyses, and the like that is associated with semanticrules 412 that enable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 mayalso provide for metadata enrichment of aggregated data, interpretationor translation of aggregated data, as well as permit the creation ofknowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary,thesaurus or the like.

Referring again to FIG. 15, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated expenditure information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a semanticfacility 1502. The semantic facility 1502 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The semantic facility 1502 may provide or berelated to semantic rules, metadata creation, metadata enrichment,interpretation of aggregated data, such as syndicated data/information1302, translation of aggregated data, such as syndicateddata/information 1302, creation of knowledge structures, a dictionaryand/or a thesaurus, such as described herein. The semantic facility 1502may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 15may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may publish and/or subscribe toand/or interact with syndicated data regarding its expenditures forpatient care, such as office visits, admissions, outpatient care,medications, surgical interventions, resource utilization, etc. as partof cost-effectiveness research, cost-benefit analyses, and the like towhich others may subscribe and/or publish and/or with which others mayinteract.

In embodiments, the syndicated data regarding its expenditures forpatient care, such as office visits, admissions, outpatient care,medications, surgical interventions, resource utilization, etc. as partof cost-effectiveness research, cost-benefit analyses, and the like maybe further associated with information that may provide for themanagement of the data. For example, the aggregated data may list theauthor of the aggregated data, the date on which it was authored, etc.Thus, the data may provide for further aggregation, republication, andthe like.

Referring again to FIG. 16, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated expenditure information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a syndicationfacility 1602. The syndication facility 1602 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The syndication facility 1602 may publish,subscribe to, aggregate and republish aggregated data, such assyndicated data/information 1302, such as described herein. Thesyndication facility 1602 may also manage syndication information 1302,such as described herein. The syndication facility 1602 may, forexample, be deployed as a service in a services oriented architecture orusing the other techniques described above with reference to FIGS. 4 and5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 16 may be data feeds, suchas data feed 202. A user 1304 may also publish, republish and/orsubscribe to a content source 204, data feed 202, aggregator 210 and/orsyndication facility 1602.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its expenditures for patient care, such as office visits,admissions, outpatient care, medications, surgical interventions,resource utilization, etc. as part of cost-effectiveness research,cost-benefit analyses, and the like within an infrastructure 416 thatprovides for data security, authentication, management of the trafficcreated by the RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels,logging and pinging technology, and/or other communications.

Referring again to FIG. 17, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated expenditure information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through aninfrastructure 1702. The infrastructure 1702 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The infrastructure 1702 may provide or berelated to security, authentication, traffic management, logging,pinging and/or communications, such as described herein. Theinfrastructure 1702 may, for example, be deployed as a service in aservices oriented architecture or using the other techniques describedabove with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrowsof FIG. 17 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its expenditures for patient care, such as office visits,admissions, outpatient care, medications, surgical interventions,resource utilization, etc. as part of cost-effectiveness research,cost-benefit analyses, and the like that is associated with specialformatting and/or display properties.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its expenditures for patient care, such as office visits,admissions, outpatient care, medications, surgical interventions,resource utilization, etc. as part of cost-effectiveness research,cost-benefit analyses, and the like that is associated with specialidentification properties. Within the health care setting, attention topatient confidentiality, for example, may require deidentifying suchdata.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its expenditures for patient care, such as office visits,admissions, outpatient care, medications, surgical interventions,resource utilization, etc. as part of cost-effectiveness research,cost-benefit analyses, and the like, that is associated with propertiesallowing for transactional processing. The transactions may be financialtransactions, such as related to medical reimbursement and/orsubscription fees or other charges for access to the syndicatedevidence-based information.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its expenditures for patient care, such as office visits,admissions, outpatient care, medications, surgical interventions,resource utilization, etc. as part of cost-effectiveness research,cost-benefit analyses, and the like that is associated with restrictedor conditional access properties. Within the health care setting, forexample, collection and distribution of such sensitive data may requirethat access to such data be restricted.

Referring again to FIG. 18, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated expenditure information as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. The infrastructure1702 may also interact directly with the syndicated data/information1302. The users 1304 may also interact with each other. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may be associated with special properties 1802.The special properties 1802 may be related to formatting, display,identification, de-identification, transactions, restricted accessand/or conditional access, such as described herein. The specialproperties 1802 may also be associated with a service application 406,408, 410, 412, 414 and/or 416. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG.18 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its patient education programs, levels of understandingwithin its patient population, historical information appropriate toascertaining a patient's education level and medical understanding, andthe like obtained through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its patient education programs, levels of understandingwithin its patient population, historical information appropriate toascertaining a patient's education level and medical understanding, andthe like may be plotted, displayed, analyzed, or the like anddistributed to an RSS-enabled client.

In embodiments, syndicated data regarding its patient educationprograms, levels of understanding within its patient population,historical information appropriate to ascertaining a patient's educationlevel and medical understanding, and the like may be associated with anapplication 406 consisting of a client-side program. The client-sideprogram may be formatted to operate on client devices such as, a desktopcomputer, laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding its patient educationprograms, levels of understanding within its patient population,historical information appropriate to ascertaining a patient's educationlevel and medical understanding, and the like may be associated with anaggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding its patient educationprograms, levels of understanding within its patient population,historical information appropriate to ascertaining a patient's educationlevel and medical understanding, and the like may be associated with acontent management system that may provide summaries of the syndicateddata available, dates associated with the syndicated data, links toaccess the full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its patient education programs, levels of understandingwithin its patient population, historical information appropriate toascertaining a patient's education level and medical understanding, andthe like through the use of an application 406 providing socialnetworking.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its patient education programs, levels of understandingwithin its patient population, historical information appropriate toascertaining a patient's education level and medical understanding, andthe like through the use of an application 406 providing a userinterface 700 for viewing data, records, and the like. For example, aclient 102 may, in response to user input such as clicking on a title ofan item in the user interface 700, retrieve the underlying item from thecontent source 204 as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its patient education programs, levels of understandingwithin its patient population, historical information appropriate toascertaining a patient's education level and medical understanding, andthe like through the use of an application 406 associated with a mediaviewer or directly through a media viewer. For example, an RSS item mayrefer to an image source, such as an MRI image in a medical record froma hospital, and may specify a viewer for the source image that isavailable through the registry. In operation, a client (e.g. aphysician) with appropriate permissions to view the image (also asmanaged, e.g., through the metadata for the enhanced syndicationsystem), may retrieve the appropriate viewer service from the registry,and apply the viewer to view the source image.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its patient education programs, levels of understandingwithin its patient population, historical information appropriate toascertaining a patient's education level and medical understanding, andthe like through the use of an application 406 providing vertical marketintegration.

Referring again to FIG. 13, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated patient education information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through anapplication/interface/other 1308. The users 1304 may also interact witheach other. The application/interface/other 1308 may be a client-sideprogram, such as the healthcare program discussed herein, a socialnetworking application, a user interface, such as user interface 700,800 and/or 900, an application in connection with a media viewer, amedia viewer and/or an application providing for vertical marketintegration, such as described herein. The application/interface/other1308 may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 13may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its patient education programs, levels of understandingwithin its patient population, historical information appropriate toascertaining a patient's education level and medical understanding, andthe like that is associated with database functions that may permit thedata quality to be verified, provide for transformation of the data,enable searching, filtering, or clustering the patient data, orcategorizing the data into hierarchies, interrelationships, interrelatedgroups, and the like.

Referring again to FIG. 14, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated patient education information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a databasefunction 1402. The database function 1402 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The database function 1402 may be a databasefunction as described herein, such as related to data quality, datatransformation, searching, filtering, clustering, a search engine,information relationships, hierarchical relationships andcategorization, such as described herein. The database function 1402may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 14may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its patient education programs, levels of understandingwithin its patient population, historical information appropriate toascertaining a patient's education level and medical understanding, andthe like that is associated with semantic rules 412 that enable thecreation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadataenrichment of aggregated data, interpretation or translation ofaggregated data, as well as permit the creation of knowledge structures(e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like.

Referring again to FIG. 15, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated patient education information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a semanticfacility 1502. The semantic facility 1502 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The semantic facility 1502 may provide or berelated to semantic rules, metadata creation, metadata enrichment,interpretation of aggregated data, such as syndicated data/information1302, translation of aggregated data, such as syndicateddata/information 1302, creation of knowledge structures, a dictionaryand/or a thesaurus, such as described herein. The semantic facility 1502may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 15may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may publish and/or subscribe toand/or interact with syndicated data regarding its patient educationprograms, levels of understanding within its patient population,historical information appropriate to ascertaining a patient's educationlevel and medical understanding, and the like to which others maysubscribe and/or publish and/or with which others may interact.

In embodiments, the syndicated data regarding its patient educationprograms, levels of understanding within its patient population,historical information appropriate to ascertaining a patient's educationlevel and medical understanding, and the like may be further associatedwith information that may provide for the management of the data. Forexample, the aggregated data may list the author of the aggregated data,the date on which it was authored, etc. Thus, the data may provide forfurther aggregation, republication, and the like.

Referring again to FIG. 16, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated patient education information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through asyndication facility 1602. The syndication facility 1602 may alsointeract directly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users1304 may also interact with each other. The syndication facility 1602may publish, subscribe to, aggregate and republish aggregated data, suchas syndicated data/information 1302, such as described herein. Thesyndication facility 1602 may also manage syndication information 1302,such as described herein. The syndication facility 1602 may, forexample, be deployed as a service in a services oriented architecture orusing the other techniques described above with reference to FIGS. 4 and5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 16 may be data feeds, suchas data feed 202. A user 1304 may also publish, republish and/orsubscribe to a content source 204, data feed 202, aggregator 210 and/orsyndication facility 1602.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its patient education programs, levels of understandingwithin its patient population, historical information appropriate toascertaining a patient's education level and medical understanding, andthe like within an infrastructure 416 that provides for data security,authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSS feeds 202,web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pinging technology,and/or other communications.

Referring again to FIG. 17, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated patient education information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through aninfrastructure 1702. The infrastructure 1702 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The infrastructure 1702 may provide or berelated to security, authentication, traffic management, logging,pinging and/or communications, such as described herein. Theinfrastructure 1702 may, for example, be deployed as a service in aservices oriented architecture or using the other techniques describedabove with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrowsof FIG. 17 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its patient education programs, levels of understandingwithin its patient population, historical information appropriate toascertaining a patient's education level and medical understanding, andthe like that is associated with special formatting and/or displayproperties.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact syndicated dataregarding its patient education programs, levels of understanding withinits patient population, historical information appropriate toascertaining a patient's education level and medical understanding, andthe like that is associated with special identification and/orde-identification properties.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact syndicated dataregarding its patient education programs, levels of understanding withinits patient population, historical information appropriate toascertaining a patient's education level and medical understanding, andthe like, that is associated with properties allowing for transactionalprocessing. The transactions may be financial transactions, such asrelated to medical reimbursement and/or subscription fees or othercharges for access to the syndicated evidence-based information.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding its patient education programs, levels of understandingwithin its patient population, historical information appropriate toascertaining a patient's education level and medical understanding, andthe like that is associated with restricted or conditional accessproperties.

Referring again to FIG. 18, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated patient education information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. The infrastructure1702 may also interact directly with the syndicated data/information1302. The users 1304 may also interact with each other. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may be associated with special properties 1802.The special properties 1802 may be related to formatting, display,identification, de-identification, transactions, restricted accessand/or conditional access, such as described herein. The specialproperties 1802 may also be associated with a service application 406,408, 410, 412, 414 and/or 416. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG.18 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding device failures, external factors involved in errors,system errors, operator errors, and the like obtained through an RSSfeed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding device failures, external factors involved in errors,system errors, operator errors, and the like and distributed to anRSS-enabled client.

In embodiments, syndicated data regarding device failures, externalfactors involved in errors, system errors, operator errors, and the likemay be associated with an application 406 consisting of a client-sideprogram. The client-side program may be formatted to operate on clientdevices such as, a desktop computer, laptop computer, “pocket” personalcomputer, a cellular phone, Blackberry, personal digital assistant, orother SMS text-enabled device, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding device failures, externalfactors involved in errors, system errors, operator errors, and the likemay be associated with an aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to present syndicated data regarding device failures, externalfactors involved in errors, system errors, operator errors, and the likemay be associated with a content management system that may providesummaries of the syndicated data available, dates associated with thesyndicated data, links to access the full, non-summarized data, and thelike.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding device failures, external factors involved in errors,system errors, operator errors, and the like through the use of anapplication 406 providing social networking.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding device failures, external factors involved in errors,system errors, operator errors, and the like through the use of anapplication 406 providing a user interface 700 for viewing data,records, and the like. For example, a client 102 may, in response touser input such as clicking on a title of an item in the user interface700, retrieve the underlying item from the content source 204 asindicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding device failures, external factors involved in errors,system errors, operator errors, and the like through the use of anapplication 406 associated with a media viewer or directly through amedia viewer. For example, an RSS item may refer to an image source,such as an MRI image in a medical record from a hospital, and mayspecify a viewer for the source image that is available through theregistry. In operation, a client (e.g. a physician) with appropriatepermissions to view the image (also as managed, e.g., through themetadata for the enhanced syndication system), may retrieve theappropriate viewer service from the registry, and apply the viewer toview the source image.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding device failures, external factors involved in errors,system errors, operator errors, and the like through the use of anapplication 406 providing vertical market integration.

Referring again to FIG. 13, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated failure and error information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through anapplication/interface/other 1308. The users 1304 may also interact witheach other. The application/interface/other 1308 may be a client-sideprogram, such as the healthcare program discussed herein, a socialnetworking application, a user interface, such as user interface 700,800 and/or 900, an application in connection with a media viewer, amedia viewer and/or an application providing for vertical marketintegration, such as described herein. The application/interface/other1308 may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 13may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding device failures, external factors involved in errors,system errors, operator errors, and the like that is associated withdatabase functions that may permit the data quality to be verified,provide for transformation of the data, enable searching, filtering, orclustering the patient data, or categorizing the data into hierarchies,interrelationships, interrelated groups, and the like.

Referring again to FIG. 14, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated failure and error information events as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a databasefunction 1402. The database function 1402 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The database function 1402 may be a databasefunction as described herein, such as related to data quality, datatransformation, searching, filtering, clustering, a search engine,information relationships, hierarchical relationships andcategorization, such as described herein. The database function 1402may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 14may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding device failures, external factors involved in errors,system errors, operator errors, and the like that is associated withsemantic rules 412 that enable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules412 may also provide for metadata enrichment of aggregated data,interpretation or translation of aggregated data, as well as permit thecreation of knowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of adictionary, thesaurus or the like.

Referring again to FIG. 15, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated failure and error information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a semanticfacility 1502. The semantic facility 1502 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The semantic facility 1502 may provide or berelated to semantic rules, metadata creation, metadata enrichment,interpretation of aggregated data, such as syndicated data/information1302, translation of aggregated data, such as syndicateddata/information 1302, creation of knowledge structures, a dictionaryand/or a thesaurus, such as described herein. The semantic facility 1502may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 15may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may publish and/or subscribe toand/or interact with syndicated data regarding device failures, externalfactors involved in errors, system errors, operator errors, and the liketo which others may and/or publish and/or with which others mayinteract.

In embodiments, the syndicated data regarding device failures, externalfactors involved in errors, system errors, operator errors, and the likemay be further associated with information that may provide for themanagement of the data. For example, the aggregated data may list theauthor of the aggregated data, the date on which it was authored, etc.Thus, the data may provide for further aggregation, republication, andthe like.

Referring again to FIG. 16, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated failure and error information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through asyndication facility 1602. The syndication facility 1602 may alsointeract directly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users1304 may also interact with each other. The syndication facility 1602may publish, subscribe to, aggregate and republish aggregated data, suchas syndicated data/information 1302, such as described herein. Thesyndication facility 1602 may also manage syndication information 1302,such as described herein. The syndication facility 1602 may, forexample, be deployed as a service in a services oriented architecture orusing the other techniques described above with reference to FIGS. 4 and5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 16 may be data feeds, suchas data feed 202. A user 1304 may also publish, republish and/orsubscribe to a content source 204, data feed 202, aggregator 210 and/orsyndication facility 1602.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding device failures, external factors involved in errors,system errors, operator errors, and the like within an infrastructure416 that provides for data security, authentication, management of thetraffic created by the RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSSchannels, logging and pinging technology, and/or other communications.

Referring again to FIG. 17, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated failure and error information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through aninfrastructure 1702. The infrastructure 1702 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The infrastructure 1702 may provide or berelated to security, authentication, traffic management, logging,pinging and/or communications, such as described herein. Theinfrastructure 1702 may, for example, be deployed as a service in aservices oriented architecture or using the other techniques describedabove with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrowsof FIG. 17 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding device failures, external factors involved in errors,system errors, operator errors, and the like that is associated withspecial formatting and/or display properties.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact syndicated dataregarding device failures, external factors involved in errors, systemerrors, operator errors, and the like that is associated with specialidentification and/or de-identification properties.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact syndicated dataregarding device failures, external factors involved in errors, systemerrors, operator errors, and the like, that is associated withproperties allowing for transactional processing. The transactions maybe financial transactions, such as related to medical reimbursementand/or subscription fees or other charges for access to the syndicatedevidence-based information.

In embodiments, healthcare institutions may interact with syndicateddata regarding device failures, external factors involved in errors,system errors, operator errors, and the like that is associated withrestricted or conditional access properties.

Referring again to FIG. 18, the syndicated data/information 1302 may besyndicated failure and error information as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. The infrastructure1702 may also interact directly with the syndicated data/information1302. The users 1304 may also interact with each other. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may be associated with special properties 1802.The special properties 1802 may be related to formatting, display,identification, de-identification, transactions, restricted accessand/or conditional access, such as described herein. The specialproperties 1802 may also be associated with a service application 406,408, 410, 412, 414 and/or 416. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG.18 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

An important component of improving a patient's health care experienceis providing a medical practice setting that is efficiently andeffectively managed. Inefficiencies may frustrate the patient in his orher encounter with the provider, and may increase the costs in time andmoney to patient and provider alike. For example, inefficient managementof a patient's office visits, diagnostic tests and therapeuticprocedures may result in wasting the patient's time, delayingappropriate treatments and carrying out interventions without adequateinformation. Similarly, ineffective management may deprive a patient ofneeded services or may impose additional costs on patient or provider.For example, ineffective management of relationships with third-partypayers may result in delay or denial of approval for medical services,unnecessary out-of-pocket costs to patients, and less-than-appropriatereimbursement to the health care provider.

Efficient and effective medical office management advantageouslyintegrates systems governing the use of time, the flow of informationand the organization of business functions. Scheduling a procedure, forexample, involves features of time management such as identifyingappointment times that fit with the diagnostic plan (e.g., mammogramscheduled before MRI, and both tests completed before biopsy) and thatfit with the doctor's, the patient's and the facility's availability. Atime management protocol may be advantageously integrated withinformation management, so that both doctor and patient can access thedata derived from a sequence of tests in order to inform subsequentdecisions. A time management protocol may also be advantageouslyintegrated with business functions within the office. For example,procedures should be scheduled only when proper approval has beenobtained for third-party reimbursement coverage. As another example,patients should have access to information about the economicconsequences of scheduling a particular medical procedure (e.g., partialcoverage for certain procedures or deductible levels that must be met)before the scheduling takes place.

In the medical practice setting, a number of users from differentconstituencies participate in time management systems, informationmanagement systems and business management systems, increasing thecomplexity of integrating these systems. For example, doctors, supportstaff, patients and schedulers may all participate in decisionssurrounding time use, along with related institutions such as diagnosticcenters and hospitals. As another example, doctors, patients, clinicalstaff and back office staff may all help direct the flow of health careor practice management information, along with external communities suchas medical specialty organizations, patient interest groups and serviceproviders like accountants and lawyers. As a further example, patients,office staff, physicians and third parties are all involved in decisionspertaining to certain business functions, such as obtainingreimbursement for a particular procedure.

In more detail, where reimbursement issues are involved for example, thepatient is concerned about whether the procedure will be covered by herhealth care insurance, and about the amount of her co-pay, while theoffice staff is concerned about proper diagnosis and procedure coding,and about the claim filing processes that a particular payer requires.The physician, also concerned about accurate coding for diagnosis andtreatment, is further concerned about conforming to certain third-partyprocedures for arranging appropriate coverage for a patient. Beforesurgery, for example, physicians may need to draft letters to theprospective payer requesting coverage or justifying their treatmentdecisions, or physicians may need to document their diagnostic findingsin a particular way. As will be understood by those of ordinary skill inthe art, diagnoses may be identified by numeric codes, for example thoseprovided by the International Classification of Diseases (“ICD”) codingsystems, most recently revised as ICD-10, by Diagnostic Related Groups(“DRG”) codes, and the like, and procedures may be identified by numericcodes, for example those provided by the AMA Current ProcedureTerminology (“CPT”) coding system and the like. External institutionssuch as the federal Department of Health and Human Services Centers forMedicare and Medicaid Services (“CMS”), state-based Medicaidorganizations, managed care organizations (“MCOs”), health maintenanceorganizations (“HMOs”), health care insurance indemnity plans and thelike may further affect the reimbursement process by enacting changes incoding, in preapproval procedures or in reimbursement schedules. Changesenacted by third parties may materially alter the behavior of patient,physician or office staff with respect to reimbursement-related businessfunctions.

There is a constant interplay among systems and among constituencies inan office-based medical practice. Reimbursement restrictions for apatient may impact, for example, what treatment she elects or whichprovider she sees. A patient thus may select a provider based on thatprovider's participation in the patient's health plan. But informationmanagement systems within a practice may sway the patient's original,economically-motivated decision. Thus, systems that a practice providesfor informing patients about their medical conditions and theirtreatment options may support a particular patient's decision to seektreatment within that practice, even if those providers are outside herpreferred provider network. As another example, information systems mayallow a patient to opt for a more cost-effective treatment plan, or atreatment plan that coincides with her health plan's reimbursementrestrictions. A physician, similarly, may utilize information systems tolearn about the reimbursement impacts of various treatment plans so thatshe adds an appropriate economic dimension to her discussion of therisks, benefits and alternatives of a particular course of treatment.Reimbursement affects time management, too. A patient may wish toschedule all the stages of a procedure within a calendar year so thatshe will only have to pay one year's deductible.

Furthermore, communities of users may form loosely around a certainmanagement issue, and dissolve when the issue has resolved. Schedulingan operation commonly involves arranging a number of tests and officevisits before surgery, booking time in the operating room, anddetermining the nature of post-operative inpatient and/or outpatientfollow-up. The scheduler bases these arrangements on patientavailability, physician availability and resource availability(operating room, intensive care facility, hospital room, personnel,equipment, and the like). The scheduler in the medical office, thepatient and the surgeon all form a loose community around the issue ofarranging the procedure and its concomitants. After the surgery andrelated health care appointments and resources are all scheduled, thecommunity may dissolve. If problems in the original schedule arise, thesame community may reassemble, or new/different participants may join.

As the examples herein illustrate, a medical practice is an openenvironment, interacting with various external systems and institutions.Management of these interactions forms an important aspect of running anefficient and effective medical practice. Reimbursement specialistswithin medical practices, for example, must keep informed about changesin third-party reimbursement regulations or procedures, which may differamong payers and across time. Policy changes in CMS, for example, maylikewise impact the reimbursement process within an office. Areimbursement specialist may increase efficiencies in claim processingby having ready and organized access to each payer's policies andprocedures. As another example, medical offices and physicians haveconstant interaction with the external systems comprising the legalsystem. A multitude of legal rules and regulations affect medicalbehavior. Reimbursement, governed by diagnosis and procedure codes asmentioned herein, takes place under an overarching legal scheme thatstrictly penalizes willful inaccuracies and claim fraud. Doctors, officemanagers and legal advisors all share an interest in conforming thepractice's reimbursement-related behavior to this regulatory framework.As yet another example, on-call schedules for physicians belonging to amedical practice must intersect with hospital staff requirements foremergency service coverage. These schedules in turn are designed to beconsistent with legal guidelines for medical malpractice riskmanagement.

In certain embodiments, physicians, schedulers, patients, diagnosticfacilities, hospitals, treatment centers and the like may interact withmedical practice time management systems in a syndicated format viasyndicated data obtained through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream,or RSS channel, to enable more efficient and effective use of time forall constituents within a medical practice setting. The syndicated timemanagement systems may include patient schedules, facility schedules,physician availability, office appointment schedules and the like. Usingan enhanced syndication system, each user may periodically publishupdated availability as a syndicated feed. Access to each user's feedmay be controlled using a conditional access service. An aggregator maygather availability streams from the users and publish an eventscheduling feed. This feed may, for example, include periods of commonavailability, or may include requests for revisions to publishedavailability. In another aspect, each user may derive a daily, weekly,or monthly schedule using the scheduling information within that user'sfeed, along with any appropriate filters. The schedule may be convertedinto a useful format for the user, such as a word document, HTMLdocument, or Microsoft Outlook calendar entries. In another aspect, auser may process a scheduling feed to generate and publish a new feed ofreminders based upon, for example, user preferences.

In embodiments, the saving, storing, merging, retrieval and publicationof syndicated time management information through RSS feed 202, webfeed, RSS stream or RSS channel may be associated with an application406 consisting of a client-side program. The client-side program may beformatted to operate on client devices such as a desktop computer, alaptop computer, a pocket personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like. The client-side program may be an individual one,such as a Palm Pilot scheduler, or an enterprise one, such as anintegrated office practice scheduler, and may use proprietary softwareor commercially available software such as Microsoft Outlook. As anexample, a physician may retrieve her schedule for any particular day onher Palm Pilot or Blackberry, with real-time updating.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with the syndicated time management systems may beassociated with an aggregator 210 to track updates. A scheduler in amedical office, for example, can keep track of changing availability ofappointment times in a consultant's office so that she can coordinate apatient's consultation appointment with arranging the tests that thepatient needs before he sees the consultant.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated time management systems may beassociated with a content management system that may provide summariesof the syndicated data available, dates associated with the syndicateddata, links to access the full, non-summarized data, parametersassociated with particular scheduling decisions, and the like. Forexample, an office scheduler who accesses a data summary indicating thata certain consultant is unavailable may retrieve full, non-summarizeddata that contains information about who will be covering for theconsultant in his absence, so that she can select one of the coveringphysicians to see the patient instead. Alternatively, for example, apatient may access the same data summary and full, non-summarized dataabout available consultants, and he may perform further research on theconsultants before informing the office manager which one(s) would beacceptable. The full, non-summarized data available from the RSS feed202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel may include, for example,information about each consultant's education and training, areas ofspecialization, academic affiliations, and publications.

In embodiments, patients, providers, office staff, consultants,hospitals, diagnostic centers, treatment facilities such as operatingrooms and interventional radiology suites, and specialized equipmentvendors may interact with syndicated time management systems through theuse of a RSS-enabled application 406 providing social networking. As anexample, an interventional cardiologist who has been consulted for acoronary diagnostic/therapeutic angiography/angioplasty that may involvestent placement may track the temporal progress of a patient'spreliminary diagnostic tests to determine when the patient will be readyfor the procedure. The office equipment manager may also track thepatient's progress through the preliminary tests to be sure that theproper stent will be on hand for the procedure, or that the proper stentis available just-in-time for the anticipated intervention. In likemanner, the equipment vendor providing stents may keep track of thecardiologist's inventory and map against upcoming scheduled proceduresto be sure that the proper stent is available for each procedure. Thecardiologist's office staff may track an as-yet-unscheduled angiographypatient's overall temporal progress through his pre-procedureappointments so that the staff allocates time in the angiography suiteand arrange physician and nursing availability only after certainpreliminary tests have been scheduled and their results obtained.Arranging the angiographic procedure, for example, may be delayed untila radionuclide scan for cardiac function has been performed. Thecardiologist's office staff may wish to ensure operating suiteavailability for emergencies before scheduling an interventionalangiography (i.e., one with angioplasty and stent placement). Tocontinue this example, the primary care office staff, in collaborationwith the cardiologist's practice management system, may interrogateother syndicated practice time management systems to arrangemultidisciplinary follow-up for the angiography patient's cardiovasculardisease, including setting up dietician consultations, cardiacrehabilitation exercise programs, concurrent disease management (e.g.,diabetes or hypertension education and treatment programs), and thelike.

In embodiments, patients, providers, office staff, consultants,hospitals, diagnostic centers, treatment facilities, and specializedequipment vendors may interact with syndicated time management systemsthrough the use of a RSS-enabled application 406 providing a userinterface 700 for viewing data, records and the like. For example, aclient 102 may, in response to user input such as clicking on a date ina calendar format in the user interface, retrieve the underlying itemfrom the content source 204 as indicated by an arrow 208. The underlyingitem may include data about a test result for a scheduled diagnosticprocedure that has been completed, or tracking information that showshow the data pertaining to a diagnostic test is being “processed.” Forexample, a tissue sample may be provided with a bar code or otheridentifier that allows it to be tracked through the laboratory.Syndicated information about its path through the laboratory may beavailable as the sample progresses through the laboratory. A client 102who clicks on a calendar date in the user interface 700 may learn thatthe tissue sample obtained on that calendar date was received in thepathology lab on the same date and was examined by the pathologist onthe same date by frozen section, but has not yet been examined bypermanent section. The user interface 700 may allow the client 102 tofollow the sample's progress through the diagnostic process, so that heis notified when the pathologist dictates the final report on thesample, or so that a copy of the pathologist's report is transmitted tothe client 102 when available.

In embodiments, patients, providers, office staff, consultants,hospitals, diagnostic centers, treatment facilities and specializedequipment vendors may interact with syndicated time utilizationmanagement systems through the use of a RSS-enabled application 406providing a media viewer. For example, a client 102 who clicks on acalendar date corresponding to the date of a patient's XRay, CT scan,MRI, echocardiogram, angiogram, ultrasound and the like may obtain thecorresponding images as still images or as video images. In certainembodiments, the media viewer may include an image management programpermitting, for example, three-dimensional reconstruction of images,template planning for prosthetic reconstruction or for hardwareconstruction. An orthopedic technician, for example, may use a templateprogram superimposed upon the media viewer that allows him to orderappropriate implants based on diagnostic images of a patient's fracture.As another example, the radiologist using the media viewer to view amammogram performed on a certain date may access an image database toretrieve the patient's previous mammograms for comparison, and maythereafter compare them electronically through use of a comparatorprogram or algorithm.

As yet another example, a physician who has read the pathology report ona particular tissue sample may click on links to images of the specimenobtained during its microscopic examination. The media viewer for themicroscopic images of the specimen may include links to tissue samplereference images so that the physician may compare the specimen imagewith the image of a normal specimen. An additional program may beavailable within the media viewer to compare features of the sample withnormal histological features to highlight pathological diagnoses,permitting, for example, comparison with the dictated pathology report.In such an example, a diagnostic image-recognition program may point outon the tissue specimen image areas where tumor cells have invaded thetissue itself, or have spread into lymphatics or blood vessels, alongwith areas where the tumor cells remain within the ducts, all featureson the image that are consistent with a dictated pathology report thatrecites “invasive breast cancer with lymphatic and vascular invasion,accompanied by an extensive intraductal component.” A media viewer for atissue specimen may be adapted for social networking, for example, forpatient viewing during consultations where the physician wishes to showthe patient the results of her biopsy, or for reviewing a case withcolleagues.

In embodiments, patients, providers, office staff, consultants,hospitals, diagnostic centers, treatment facilities, and specializedequipment vendors may interact with syndicated time utilizationmanagement systems associated with special formatting and/or displayproperties. In response to a patient query, for example, data may beformatted to provide a pre-operative and post-operative schedule ofappointments pertaining to a surgical procedure that has been arranged.In response to a physician query, data may be formatted to set forth theparticular patient's schedule as part of the physician's overallcalendar that includes on-call responsibilities, time in the office andtime out of the office.

In embodiments, patients, providers, office staff, consultants,hospitals, diagnostic centers, treatment facilities, and specializedequipment vendors may interact with syndicated time utilizationmanagement systems having special identification properties, or havingrestricted or conditional access properties. Controlling access to datawithin a time utilization management system has particular importance inthe medical office management context because of the overarchingregulatory requirements of the Health Insurance Portability andAccountability Act of 1996 (“HIPAA”), which sets forth, inter alia,Privacy Rules and Security Rules governing interactions between patientsand health care providers. As will be understood by those of skill inthe art, the HIPAA Security Rules, while technology-neutral, require anevaluation of the security measures in place for a particular provideror health care facility, an accurate and thorough risk analysis, and aseries of documented solutions derived from a number of complex factorsunique to that institution. In deciding which security measures to use,a provider or health care facility (both termed “covered entities” inthe HIPAA regulations) takes into account its size, the costs ofappropriate security measures and their operational impact. For example,covered entities are expected to balance risks of inappropriatedisclosure or use of electronically protected health information(“EPHI”) against the impact of various security-protective measures, sothat smaller, less sophisticated practices will not have to implement asextensive a security system as larger, more complex entities. Securitystandards under HIPAA are divided into three categories: administrative,physical and technical safeguards. Technical safeguards, in particular,are suitable for integration with an enhanced syndication system thatincludes a formatting service to format content for display inaccordance with security parameters. Technical safeguards may includeauthentication controls to verify that the person requesting access toEPHI is authorized for such access, and encryption for data beingtransmitted or stored. An authentication and encryption service mayprovide selective access to certain data, such as identification onpatient health information, or such a service may providepassword-protected access to certain data modules.

In embodiments, patients, providers, office staff, consultants,hospitals, diagnostic centers, treatment facilities, and specializedequipment vendors may interact with syndicated time utilizationmanagement systems associated with database functions that permit thedata quality to be verified, provide for transformation of data, enablesearching, filtering or clustering of data, or categorizing the datainto hierarchies, interrelationships, interrelated groups and the like.For example, database functions applied to syndicated time utilizationmanagement systems may allow for identification of a practice's mostcommonly performed procedures by collecting data from physicianschedules, or for determination of a practice's demographics bycollecting data from office visits or de-identified patient records.Such information, in turn, may be used to justify practice resourceallocation or marketing strategies. Similarly, database functionsapplied to syndicated time utilization management systems may providestatistics about procedure outcomes, including length of hospital stayfor a particular diagnosis, number of post-operative visits, resourcesutilized, complications and the like, statistics that are useful withinthe managed care context for negotiating with carriers.

As another example, syndicated time utilization management systemsassociated with database functions may facilitate physiciancredentialing and monitoring of continuing medical education (“CME”).Formal educational sessions like conferences, for example, may beentitled to a particular level of CME credit, and less formal activities(self-study, journal club and the like) may be entitled to a differentlevel of CME credit. Medical license renewal may require a designatednumber of credit hours at each level. Hospital or operating facilitycredentialing may require a designated number of credit hours pertainingto particular topics, or may require documentation of a particularnumber of procedures performed. A syndicated time utilization managementsystem may permit the physician to log all CME-related activities in adatabase so that the activities may be sorted by type of CME activity(course, workshop, grand rounds, journal review, article-writing,teaching, etc.), by medical topic (infectious diseases, primary care,general surgery, risk management, medical economics), or by any otherdesirable parameter. The syndicated time utilization management systemmay then allow sorted information to be retrieved, for example, byphysicians cataloguing their own experience for credentialing, licenserenewal or malpractice insurance purposes. The system may further allowinformation to be retrieved, for example, by interested third partiessuch as malpractice carriers, hospital credentialing committees, medicalspecialty organizations, state boards of registration in medicine, andthe like.

In embodiments, patients, providers, office staff, consultants,hospitals, diagnostic centers, treatment facilities, and specializedequipment vendors may interact with syndicated time utilizationmanagement systems associated with semantic rules that may enable thecreation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadataenrichment, interpretation or translation of syndicated time utilizationmanagement systems, as well as permit the creation of knowledgestructures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary, thesaurus orthe like. Use of metadata for syndicated time utilization managementsystems may permit the retrieval, for example, of all physicianencounters with a particular disease entity within a certain time frame.In this way, the collective practice experience with the disease entitycan be collected and reported, including patient visits, continuingmedical education conferences, journal club articles and the like. Suchinformation may be useful as an adjunct to risk management, forphysician self-education, or as a basis for practice marketing.

In embodiments, patients, providers, office staff, consultants,hospitals, diagnostic centers, treatment facilities, and specializedequipment vendors may interact with syndicated time utilizationmanagement systems to which others may subscribe. For example, within amedical practice all physicians may be able to subscribe to an RSS feed202, web feed, RSS stream or RSS channel that sets forth the officeschedule, on-call schedule and prospective out-of-office plans for eachphysician so that this information can guide them in making plans forattending conferences, setting up complicated operations that requiremulti-physician coverage, or arranging family vacations. As anotherexample, all physicians within a practice may be able to subscribe to anRSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream or RSS channel that displaysparameters of physician workload and/or performance.

In embodiments, the time management systems may be associated withinformation that may provide for further processing and management ofthe data. For example, the data may list the time management systemsource, the date on which it was last updated, etc. Thus, the data mayprovide for further aggregation, republication and the like.

In embodiments, patients, providers, office staff, consultants,hospitals, diagnostic centers, treatment facilities, and specializedequipment vendors may interact with syndicated time utilizationmanagement systems within an infrastructure 416 that provides for datasecurity, authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSSfeeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pingingtechnology, and/or other communications. Such an infrastructure maypermit patient notification when test results are available, forexample, by a pinging system. Similarly, a patient who is awaiting anopening in a busy practice schedule may be pinged to alert her to accessthe time utilization management system and reserve the open slot. If shedoes not respond in time, and the slot becomes filled, another messageor ping may be sent to alert her that the opening is no longeravailable. As another example, the infrastructure may correlatephysician CME activities with various regulatory requirements, to trackthe physician's progress in accumulating CME credits and map it againstthe timeframe within which such credits should be accumulated. Thephysician may then receive a message indicating that his CME progresshas fallen off-track, so that he can take steps to acquire the necessarycredits.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedinformation management systems via syndicated data obtained through anRSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel, to enable moreefficient and effective use of information for all constituents within amedical practice setting. The syndicated information management systemsmay include medical record data, virtual patient management data,patient input or output data, tracking data and the like. The syndicatedinformation management systems may employ any of the functions andfeatures of the enhanced syndication system described above, includingsecurity, conditional access, traffic management, logging, semanticanalysis, database services, and so forth. In one aspect, a syndicatedinformation management system as disclosed herein may provide thefunctionality of an enterprise content management system usingsyndicated content and outlines delivered through the enhancedsyndication system.

In embodiments, the saving, storing, merging, retrieval and publicationof syndicated information management information through RSS feed 202,web feed, RSS stream or RSS channel may be associated with anapplication 406 consisting of a client-side program. The client-sideprogram may be formatted to operate on client devices such as a desktopcomputer, a laptop computer, a pocket personal computer, a cellularphone, Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like. The client-side program may be an individual one,such as a Palm Pilot scheduler, or an enterprise one for the input andmanagement of medical information. As an example, a client-side programand device may permit input of medical information obtained duringoff-site patient encounters, such as examinations performed or treatmentplans formulated during hospital rounds. This information may be madeavailable in the office-based official medical record, and it may beretrieved by practitioners in the medical practice, or by otherpractitioners (within the hospital setting, for example) who subscribeto the medical practice's syndicated information management system.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with the syndicated information management systems maybe associated with an aggregator 210 to track updates. In this way,medical information may be collected chronologically, as patient-relateddata (test results, reports and the like) and management decisionsevolve over time. In this way, for example, changes in a patient'streatment plan may be tracked and updated over time, so that a patient,a physician or a third party such as an emergency room or a commercialpharmacy may retrieve the patient's current medication schedule.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated information management systems may beassociated with a content management system that may provide summariesof the syndicated data available, dates associated with the syndicateddata, links to access the full, non-summarized data, parametersassociated with medical information, and the like. In certainembodiments, the content management system may include a proprietaryprogram for developing and maintaining electronic medical records. Acontent management system as applied to prescribing medications, forexample, may include with each prescription the physician packageinsert, a patient-friendly summary of the package insert, a list ofother medications that the patient is taking, a database and algorithmfor identifying conflicts among prescribed medications, apatient-customized schedule for when to take medications (before meals,with food, at bedtime, etc.), and the like. It will be understood bypractitioners of ordinary skill that a variety of content managementsystems may be advantageous, for example in caring for patients withcomplex disorders with multiple medications (e.g., HIV, diabetes,cancers, etc.).

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedinformation management systems through the use of a RSS-enabledapplication 406 providing social networking. As an example, a consultantmay retrieve and share syndicated data with other healthcare providerswith whom she shares care for a patient, a clinical specialty, clinicalpopulation type, and the like. Clinical factors of relevance tophysicians who seek to share medical information may use detailed tagsto provide narrowly tailored RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, orRSS channels for ongoing data sharing with colleagues. Such a processmay allow physicians who care for a common patient or patient populationto share data more efficiently and to improve cross-specialtycollaboration in patient care. With a syndicated information managementsystem, a visit by a particular patient to a consultant and anyassociated data becomes available to the primary care physician forretrieval via RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel withoutthe delay associated with paper records or specifically-deliveredelectronic communications (faxes, emails and the like). Such systems maypermit virtual case management for a particular patient.

With a syndicated information management system, a patient'sinteractions with providers outside the medical practice may beseamlessly integrated into an overall patient management protocol. Anorthopedist's operative notes and office visit records, for example, maybe available to the physical therapist or visiting nurse who isproviding post-operative care; similarly, the orthopedist may retrievevia RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel those notesproduced by the therapist or visiting nurse pertaining to thepost-operative care of the patient. Tags attached to the notes may alertthe physician to situations where the outside provider observes adeviation from the physician's treatment plan or a deviation from normalprogress milestones, so that the physician may take appropriatemeasures.

A syndicated information management system may, for example, permit amedical practice to establish a comprehensive home monitoring program.The physician may provide a treatment plan with specific elementsavailable to particular providers in the community. Such providers mayalso retrieve patient data that is relevant to their role in patientcare. A physical therapist, for example, would need different patientinformation than a dietician or a social worker. Different patient careroles may correspond to different security levels or access routeswithin the syndicated information management system.

A syndicated information management system may further provide forcommunications from a patient via email or other electronic submissions.Email correspondence from a patient may be tagged with identifiers thatindicate its subject matter, level of urgency, and the like. The emailcorrespondence may be triaged to the appropriate respondent, whetherphysician, nurse, office manager, physical therapist, etc. A syndicatedinformation management system may include other input from the patient,such as a logbook of symptoms (e.g., angina experienced at 6 AM, 10 AMand 3 PM on Dec. 10, 2005), a record of data (e.g., Dec. 10, 2005weight, blood pressure and dietary intake), a record ofhealth-maintenance activities (e.g., Dec. 10, 2005 cardiac exerciseclass 1.0 hours, brisk walking 0.5 hours, resistance exercises 0.5hours, yoga 1.0 hours), and the like, allowing providers to review thepatient's participation in or compliance with treatment plans.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedinformation management systems through the use of an applicationproviding a media viewer. For example, a RSS item may refer to an imagesource, such as an MRI image in the medical record from a hospital, andmay specify a viewer for the source image that is available through theregistry. In operation, a client with appropriate permissions may viewthe image (also as managed, e.g., through the metadata for the enhancedsyndication system), may retrieve the appropriate viewer service fromthe registry and may apply the viewer to view the source image. Forexample, a physical therapist may retrieve a patient's XRays or MRIsbefore instituting a therapy protocol. As another example, a visitingnurse may capture images of a healing wound that the physician canretrieve to track a patient's progress. When images are captured using astable or calibrated image scale, they may be compared over time todetermine whether a wound is getting better or worse. A visiting nurseor a patient may also capture digital video images, digital audio,diagnostic instrument output and the like as real-time or archived data.A patient experiencing a worrisome symptom, for example, may transmitreal-time data via webcam to a physician who may then use the data as abasis for diagnosis or treatment. Those of ordinary skill in the art arefamiliar with a variety of instruments for professional or home care(digital otoscopes, ophthalmoscopes, blood pressure monitors etc.) thatare suitable for these purposes. Such tools for image capture and fordigital data capture in the community setting may permit patientmonitoring and patient care to be carried out remotely.

A syndicated information management system may further provide forcommunications to a patient via email or other electronic means. Forexample, a surgeon's office may provide descriptive information orinstructions regarding an operation or post-operative care for retrievalvia RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel. Such informationor instructions may involve documents, audible instructions, graphics,still images, emails, live chat or video clips. For example, a patientwith questions about how to apply a surgical dressing or how to carryout a particular physical therapy exercise may download a video thatillustrates performing the technique. As another alternative, thepatient may interact with a health care provider (e.g., nurse ortherapist) via live chat or via email to have specific questionsanswered. Advantageously, interactions with the syndicated informationmanagement system may be logged, recorded and permanently archived formedicolegal purposes, or may be incorporated in the patient's medicalrecord.

As another example, a syndicated information management system maypermit patients to interact with other patients or healthcare providersvia RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream or RSS channel to obtain orexchange information about a particular procedure or medical condition.As described herein, HIPAA and other regulatory frameworks may requirespecial identification properties, or restricted or conditional accessproperties for information to be exchanged in this way. Interactionswith the syndicated medical information management system and theproperties restricting this access may be logged, recorded andpermanently archived for legal purposes or to demonstrate compliancewith applicable regulations.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedinformation management systems through the use of an applicationproviding a user interface 700 for viewing information related to aparticular health-care issue. For example, a customized user interfacemay be available to a patient about to undergo a particular procedure,so that she can readily access her medical records and test results, canreview post-operative instructions and discuss them with officepersonnel via live chat, can obtain further procedure-specificinformation from the practice patient education library, and caninteract with other patients who have consented to participate inprocedure-related discussions. A client 102 may, in response to userinput such as clicking on a title of an item in the user interface 700,retrieve the underlying item from the content source 204 as indicated bythe arrow 208.

For example, a user interface 700 captioned with the particularprocedure (“My Angioplasty”) may be designed with icons or other graphicdesignators that facilitate patient access to relevant information.Within the interface site, a patient may click, for example, on a “MyDiagnosis” icon to view all test results, with a query button (“Whatdoes this mean?”) to provide a patient-friendly explanation. Theinterface may offer a search function or a general query function, sothat a patient may easily find answers to questions about when aparticular pre-op procedure is scheduled, for example, or what articleshe will need to bring with him to the hospital. A patient may alsofollow a logical path through angioplasty-related information that couldbe represented graphically on the interface. A clickable image maydisplay a timeline pertaining to the patient's illness, for example,allowing retrieval of information pertaining to steps in symptomdevelopment, diagnosis, treatment or recovery. A timeline showing allthe salient dates so far in a patient's illness may begin, for example,with Sunday, Jan. 1, 2006 and include dates through Friday, Jan. 20,2006. Clicking on the “Sunday, Jan. 1, 2006” segment of the timeline maydisplay information pertaining to the patient's onset of cardiacsymptoms, his presentation in the emergency room, and the initialdiagnostic evaluation and therapeutic intervention performed on thatday. Clicking on the “Friday, Jan. 20, 2006” segment of the timeline maydisplay information pertaining to the patient's definitive procedure,for example, the angioplasty scheduled for that day. As another approachto the same information, the patient may click on an icon called “MyDiagnosis” or “My Treatment” to access a page providing, for example,chronological listing of diagnostic procedures and their results, or alisting of treatment interventions, their reasons, their outcomes andtheir follow-up. Clickable links on any given page may permit readynavigation throughout the interface

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedinformation management systems through the use of an applicationproviding vertical market integration. Vertical market integration mayproceed in a top-down or bottom-up way. For example, as managed careorganizations or prescription drug benefits plans alter theirformularies, this information may be provided top-down to physicianscaring for the affected patient populations (covered lives of a managedcare organization, or Medicare recipients, for example). Physicians thenmay use formulary information in their prescribing decisions. Along thesame lines, if physicians in a practice consistently prescribe a drugthat is not included in the formulary, compiling information about thedrug's indications and clinical efficacy may be submitted bottom-up tomanaged care organizations and the like to support including that drugin future formulary listings.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedinformation management systems that support special formatting and/ordisplay properties of syndicated content. Formatting and displayproperties may, for example, be embedded in metadata associated with asyndicated feed.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedinformation management systems that support use of specialidentification properties, which may be used, for example, to providepersonalization, depersonalization, access control, privacy, security,HIPAA compliance, and so forth.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedinformation management systems that are associated with restricted orconditional access properties. A medical practice may accumulateinformation about outcomes from a particular procedure on apatient-by-patient basis, for example, including length of hospitalstay, complications and other sequelae. Such information may beavailable with patient identifiers to physicians within the practice,but may not be accessible to other health care institutions except on ade-identified basis. The practice may decide not to allow the generalpopulation of patients access to such information at all, or may onlygrant patients or prospective patients access to certain aspects of theinformation, for example statistics about length of hospital stay orstatistics about incidence of complications.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedinformation management systems associated with database functions thatpermit the data quality to be verified, provide for transformation ofdata, enable searching, filtering or clustering of data, or categorizingthe data into hierarchies, interrelationships, interrelated groups andthe like. For example, database functions applied to syndicatedinformation management systems may allow an individual to search forinformation that a practice has accumulated regarding a particularsurgical procedure. Such information may include the practice's pre- andpost-operative protocols, the number of procedures each physician hasperformed within the practice, statistics regarding procedure outcomes,contact information for other patients who have agreed (following properinformed consent) to act as resources for others undergoing theprocedure, patient satisfaction data, and the medical and scientificpublications and references that the practice has accumulated pertainingto the procedure. Access to such information may be regulated byrestricted or conditional access properties, limiting such access tocertain patient populations (for example, those who have scheduled theprocedure already), or to certain categories of healthcare personnel.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedinformation management systems associated with semantic rules thatenable, for example, the creation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 mayalso provide for metadata enrichment, interpretation or translation ofsyndicated information management systems, as well as permit thecreation of knowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of adictionary, thesaurus or the like. Use of metadata for syndicatedinformation management systems may permit, for example, theaccumulation, organization and compilation of procedure-relatedinformation such as procedure outcome, adverse events, duration ofhospitalization, number of post-operative visits and other parameters ofphysician performance and practice resource utilization. Suchcompilations may provide support for economic decisions within thepractice, for physician credentialing or for negotiations withmalpractice carriers or third-party payers.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedinformation management systems to which others may subscribe. Forexample, all patients within a medical practice may be able to subscribeto an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream or RSS channel that regularlyretrieves and updates information the practice provides pertaining to aparticular diagnosis or procedure, and that collects for the patientpublicly available information on the same topic. Physicians in aparticular practice setting may subscribe to an RSS feed 202, web feed,RSS stream or RSS channel that regularly retrieves and updatesinformation pertaining to particular scientific, medical orsocioeconomic topics (e.g., a neurologist may wish to retrievescientific information pertaining to stem cells, medical informationpertaining to treatment of Parkinson's disease (including using stemcells in such treatment), and socioeconomic information about the ethicsof using stem cells and the legislative debate regarding theiravailability for research and therapy).

In embodiments, the information management systems may be furtherassociated with information that may provide for the management of thedata. For example, the data may list the information management systemsource, the date on which it was last updated, etc. Thus, the data mayprovide for further aggregation, republication and the like. A surgeonwho has performed a series of successful operations, for example, maypublish the series through the syndicated information management systemso that other subscribing surgeons in the specialty may learn from herexperience. While such publication does not provide the quality controlof a peer-reviewed medical journal, it may offer practitioners moreimmediate access to developments in an area of specialization.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions may interact with syndicatedinformation management systems within an infrastructure 416 thatprovides for data security, authentication, management of the trafficcreated by the RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels,logging and pinging technology, and/or other communications. Such aninfrastructure may, for example, provide for patient alerts when newinformation becomes available or when deadlines are nearing. As anexample, a practice may alert all its Medicare patients when an updateon Medicare Part D coverage becomes available, either through thepractice itself or through a reliable outside source. Further, theinfrastructure may include reminders or countdowns as deadlinesapproach. Medicare patients who have not selected a prescription drugprogram may be reminded periodically as the deadline approaches, untilthey make their selection. Or, as another example, a patient who needsto avoid eating and drinking (“NPO”) for a period before a procedure canbe offered a “countdown” notification during the hours before the NPOrestriction begins.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions, and third-parties such as payers,billing services, medical specialty organizations, service providers andthe like, may interact with syndicated business management systems viasyndicated data obtained through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream,or RSS channel, to enable more efficient and effective use of businessfunctions for all constituents within a medical practice setting. Asused herein, an individual or entity having a business relationship withthe health care practice, such as those individuals and entities listedherein, may be considered a business associate of the health carepractice. The syndicated business management systems may include managedcare coverage schedules, third-party reimbursement schedules, accountingand financial management systems, billing and collection systems, costprojection systems, economic analysis systems and the like. Businessmanagement systems may rely upon proprietary or commercially availablesoftware, and may utilize all types of syndicated data.

In embodiments, the saving, storing, merging, retrieval and publicationof syndicated information management information through RSS feed 202,web feed, RSS stream or RSS channel may be associated with anapplication 406 consisting of a client-side program. The client-sideprogram may be formatted to operate on client devices such as a desktopcomputer, a laptop computer, a pocket personal computer, a cellularphone, Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like. The client-side program may be an individual one,such as a Palm Pilot scheduler, or an enterprise one for the input andmanagement of business, financial or economic data. The client-sideprogram may also be provided by a third party, for example, aproprietary accounting program that has been prepared for the medicaloffice by an accountant or consultant. As another example, medicalspecialty societies may provide practice management programs that areparticularly useful to practitioners in a certain field. Cosmeticsurgery, dermatology, etc. practices with a high volume of cash-payingpatients may find certain software advantageous, while Medicare orMedicaid-dominated specialties may find other types of softwareadvantageous.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with the syndicated business management systems may beassociated with an aggregator 210 to track updates. In this way,business-related information may be collected chronologically, asreimbursement schedules change over time, for example, or as components(e.g., rent, utilities, equipment costs, insurance charges etc.) of apractice's cost structure change. In this way, for example, a practice'sincome and expense projections can be updated to take changingassumptions into consideration.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated business management systems may beassociated with a content management system that may provide summariesof the syndicated data available, dates associated with the syndicateddata, links to access the full, non-summarized data, parametersassociated with business information, and the like. Business managementsystems may draw from other sources of syndicated data, so that they mayprovide customized information for a query. For example, a patient witha new diagnosis of breast cancer may wish to compare the costs, timeexpenditures and medical outcomes associated with two availabletreatment modalities (e.g., mastectomy vs. wide excision withradiation). Business management systems together with time utilizationmanagement systems and information management systems may provide thecustomized answers to the patient queries.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions, and third-parties such as payers,billing services, medical specialty organizations, service providers andthe like, may interact with syndicated business management systemsthrough the use of a RSS-enabled application 406 providing socialnetworking. The business manager may prepare a monthly budget, forexample, in collaboration with the practice accountant. The budget maybe integrated with an inventory management system that keeps track ofsupplies and instruments that are on hand. Other members of the officestaff may then view the budget, the inventory tracker and an ongoingtabulation of practice expenses to make decisions about purchasingsupplies or capital equipment.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions, and third-parties such as payers,billing services, medical specialty organizations, service providers andthe like, may interact with syndicated business management systemsthrough the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providing a userinterface for viewing data, records, and the like. For example, a client102 may, in response to user input such as clicking on a title of anitem in the user interface 700, retrieve the underlying item from thecontent source 204 as indicated by an arrow 208. For example, a userinterface 700 may be tailored to the needs of a back-office accountsmanager to look up the status of insurance claims processing for a setof patients, or a user interface 700 may be set up to allow the patientto track the status of coverage approval for an upcoming procedure.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions, and third-parties such as payers,billing services, medical specialty organizations, service providers andthe like, may interact with syndicated business management systemsthrough the use of an application providing a media viewer.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions, and third-parties such as payers,billing services, medical specialty organizations, service providers andthe like, may interact with syndicated business management systemsassociated with special formatting and/or display properties. Certainaccounting information, for example, may be converted into graphicrepresentations that the user could retrieve.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions, and third-parties such as payers,billing services, medical specialty organizations, service providers andthe like, may interact with syndicated business management systemsassociated with special identification properties. In embodiments,patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel or supportinghealthcare institutions, and third-parties such as payers, billingservices, medical specialty organizations, service providers and thelike, may interact with syndicated business management systemsassociated with restricted or conditional access properties. Certainmembers of the office staff, such as the business manager, may haveaccess to all business management information, while other members ofthe office staff have only limited access. Similarly, individualphysicians may be able to track the progress of insurance coveragedecisions for their own patients, but may not be able to viewinformation about other patients in the practice. The practiceaccountant, for example, may be able to retrieve all financial andresource utilization data, without access to identifiable patient data.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions, and third-parties such as payers,billing services, medical specialty organizations, service providers andthe like, may interact with syndicated business management systemsassociated with database functions that permit the data quality to beverified, provide for transformation of data, enable searching,filtering or clustering of data, or categorizing the data intohierarchies, interrelationships, interrelated groups and the like. Forexample, database functions applied to syndicated business managementsystems may allow a practice manager to compile information about theresources expended in treating a particular condition, or about theresource utilization of a particular physician. A certain condition, forexample, diabetes, may be more expensive to treat, while otherconditions, such as an acute infectious disease, may be less expensiveto the practice. Decisions about how to grow the practice may be basedin part on data about the costliness or the profitability of aparticular practice area. Such information could also guide hiringdecisions, such as whether to hire a diabetes specialist or aninfectious diseases doctor, or whether to hire additional nursingpersonnel for a certain area of the practice. Similarly, data aboutoutcome and resource utilization may be collected to determine theefficiency and profitability of a particular physician. Such informationcould guide decisions about compensation, promotion and overall practicedevelopment.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions, and third-parties such as payers,billing services, medical specialty organizations, service providers andthe like, may interact with syndicated business management systemsassociated with semantic rules that may enable the creation of metadata.Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadata enrichment,interpretation or translation of syndicated information managementsystems, as well as permit the creation of knowledge structures (e.g.,using OPML) and the use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like. Use ofmetadata for syndicated business management systems may permit, forexample, the accumulation, organization and compilation ofdiagnosis-related information such as reimbursement amount for eachthird-party payer, length of time before reimbursement, practiceresources consumed, number of patients with the diagnosis within thepractice, demographic information about the incidence of the diagnosis,and other diagnoses associated with the primary diagnosis. Suchcompilations may allow for economic projections pertaining to theprimary diagnosis, including income projections, expense projections andpractice development projections.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions, and third-parties such as payers,billing services, medical specialty organizations, service providers andthe like, may interact with syndicated business management systems towhich others may subscribe. A billing service may, for example, accessthe procedure and reimbursement information for a medical practice andsend bills such as balance bills to patients as appropriate.

In embodiments, the information management systems may be furtherassociated with information that may provide for the management of thedata. For example, the data may list the information management systemsource, the date on which it was last updated, etc. Thus, the data mayprovide for further aggregation, republication and the like. Anaccountant or consultant specializing in medical practices, for example,may aggregate information from a number of practice clients to identifytrends among the client population, and to allow the individual practiceclients to compare themselves to the larger population of medicalpractice clients. The accountant or consultant may further compare thegroup of practice clients with larger trends in the profession, andshare these comparisons with the individual clients.

In embodiments, patients, physicians and/or support staff personnel orsupporting healthcare institutions, and third-parties such as payers,billing services, medical specialty organizations, service providers andthe like, may interact with syndicated business management systemswithin an infrastructure 416 that provides for data security,authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSS feeds 202,web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pinging technology,and/or other communications. For example, a business management systemmay permit automated inventory control, with an automatic restockingorder to be generated when a certain number of medical supplies havebeen used, and with tracking of supply usage. Excess supply utilizationmay produce an alert for the office manager so that he can investigatethe utilization further. An appropriately-credentialed vendor may alsomonitor usage patterns in the office to facilitate just-in-timeprovisioning, or to offer volume-related discounts.

While the illustrative embodiments herein have described syndicated timeutilization, information and management systems as applied to medicalpractices and related support personnel and institutions, it will beunderstood by those of ordinary skill that syndicated time utilization,information and management systems (as well as other disclosure includedherein) may also be applied to other health care practices, includingbut not limited to dental practices, psychotherapeutic practices,cosmeceutical practices, chiropractic practices, osteopathic practices,physical therapy and rehabilitation practices, podiatrist practices andthe like. In addition, those of ordinary skill will further appreciatethat syndicated time utilization, information and management systems maybe applied to alternative, allopathic or nontraditional health careservices.

As medical, scientific and other academic research becomes more complex,it is desirable to have many investigators across diverse geographicsettings participate in a project. It is also desirable that allparticipants have access to a complex mix of data sources that mayinclude scientific background information, experimental data, clinicaldata about disease states or targets, laboratory notes, regulatoryrequirements and the like. Researchers may collaborate to produce apublication or other report concerning a study and its results.Researchers working together on a project may also interact with thirdparties (collectively termed “reviewers”) who review, evaluate and/orcomment upon the research, its data or its conclusions. Seamlesscommunication among collaborating researchers advances scientificprogress by making it more efficient. Transparent interaction betweenthe research team and reviewers expedites publication of researchresults and facilitates decision-making about grants and regulatoryapproval.

It is desirable, therefore, to provide researchers with access to theinternal research data, the external scientific literature, and thereal-time discoveries of their collaborators. It is further desirable toallow researchers to collaborate on authoring reports of their researchfor publication or for submission to reviewing agencies. It is alsodesirable to permit researchers to interact with interested thirdparties. Interested third parties may be reviewers, whose interactionwith researchers may include feedback or other comments pertaining tothe experimental or reporting aspects of the scientific research.Interested third parties may also include other stakeholders such aspatients, sponsors or advocacy groups, whose interaction withresearchers may keep the stakeholders informed about relevant scientificinvestigations and may keep the researchers informed about community andindustry needs.

In certain embodiments researchers may interact with collaborationmanagement systems in a syndicated format via syndicated data obtainedthrough an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel, to enablemore efficient and effective communication about research endeavors. Thesyndicated collaboration management systems may include systems forreporting experimental methods and materials, systems for documentingexperimental results, systems for analyzing experimental data, systemsfor designing clinical trials, and the like.

In embodiments, the saving, storing, merging, retrieval and publicationof collaboration management system information through RSS feed 202, webfeed, RSS stream or RSS channel may be associated with an application406 consisting of a client-side program. The client-side program may beformatted to operate on client devices such as a desktop computer, alaptop computer, a pocket personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like. The client-side program may be an individual one,such as a Palm Pilot scheduler, or an enterprise one, and may useproprietary software or commercially available software such asMicrosoft Outlook. As an example, a researcher at one location mayretrieve the experimental data of a collaborating colleague on her PalmPilot or Blackberry, with real-time updating.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with the syndicated collaboration management systemsmay be associated with an aggregator 210 to track updates. A researcherwho is part of a multisite research endeavor, for example, can keeptrack of the results being obtained by collaborating colleagues at othersites.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with collaboration management systems may be associatedwith a content management system that may provide summaries of thesyndicated data available, statistical analysis of the syndicated data,parameters associated with the data collection, or a graphicalrepresentation of the syndicated data for example on anexperiment-by-experiment basis, on a site-by-site basis, or on anaggregate basis. The content management system may further provide linksthat direct the user from a data summary to the full, non-summarizeddata. The full, non-summarized data available from the RSS feed 202, webfeed, RSS stream, or RSS channel may include, for example, informationabout the experiments conducted and the raw data obtained.

In embodiments, researchers may interact with collaboration managementsystems through the use of a RSS-enabled application 406 providingsocial networking. As an example, a medicinal chemist involved in drugdiscovery may wish to review the preclinical research being carried outin his company that pertains to a certain drug or class of drugs. Bymonitoring the bench or animal research conducted on a particular drugor class of drugs, the chemist may gain insights that would guide hisselection of other drug candidates. Collaboration management systems, byfacilitating communication among researchers in diverse geographiclocations, may inherently involve social networking. Social networkingmay involve, for example, sharing of a patient or subject population,sharing of a clinical specialty or sharing of a research interest,optionally from different perspectives. As an example, the public healthservices of a host country may wish to monitor the findings of aresearch team conducting studying a particular disease or condition thatseriously affects that country's population. Availability of a socialnetworking application may, for example, make a clinical trial protocolparticularly attractive to a host country where the results couldtranslate directly into improved health for the local citizenry. Socialnetworking may involve, for example, collaboration among researchers,patients, subjects, sponsors, reviewers, overseers, monitors orregulators.

In embodiments, researchers may interact with collaboration managementsystems through the use of a RSS-enabled application 406 providing auser interface 700 for viewing data, records and the like. For example,a client 102 may keep track of the progress of various research projectsby clicking an icon in the user interface to retrieve the underlyingitem from the content source 204 as indicated by an arrow 208. Theunderlying item may include clinical or laboratory data obtained by agroup of researchers, data pertaining to subjects enrolled in a clinicaltrial, data about the management of the clinical trial, or scientificand/or business information obtained from academic journals, webpostings and the like. For example, a clinical trial subject may betracked through the clinical trial so that individual experimentalresults about that subject may be seen. Administrative informationpertaining to an individual subject may also be tracked so that thetrial organizer can be sure that the appropriate steps have been takenfor enrolling and pre-evaluating each trial subject. As an example, aclient 102 researcher who clicks on an icon representing a clinicalprotocol may be able to determine how many patients have been enrolledat which sites, whether the appropriate informed consent has beenobtained, whether patient follow-up is proceeding on track, whethercertain patients need more individualized follow-up, and the like.

Similarly, a client 102 subject who clicks on an icon representing theprotocol in which she is participating may access information governingher participation, including tests or other requirements that she mustfulfill, materials generated by the researchers pertaining to the trialor to the condition being studied, communications with otherparticipants and the like. The information associated with the icon maybe sourced as a syndicated data stream that may be periodically updatedto provide current information.

In embodiments, researchers may interact with collaboration managementsystems through the use of a RSS-enabled application 406 providing amedia viewer. For example, a client 102 who clicks on an iconrepresenting his company's preclinical research on a drug may be able toview images corresponding to pathology results for a set of experimentalanimals who received the drug. Other images may be viewed in likemanner, including photographs, MRI images, CT scans, XRay images,ultrasound, echocardiogram, angiography, and the like, with imagescaptured as still images or as video images. In certain embodiments, themedia viewer may include an image management program permitting, forexample, three-dimensional reconstruction of images, or other imagemanipulation. For example, 3-dimensional reconstruction of images may beperformed on CT scans from an experimental animal treated withexperimental placement of bone fixation plates, allowing researchers todetermine how the animal's bone structure responds to the plates. Asanother example, a pathologist evaluating the histological slides from aseries of experimental animals may be able to compare them with eachother using an algorithm-based image comparator program. In similarmanner, a group of pathologists located at different research centersmay be able to access and compare images of the histology of allspecimens collected during the research program. The media viewer forthe microscopic images of the specimen may include links to tissuesample reference images so that the physician may compare the specimenimage with the image of a normal specimen. An additional program may beavailable within the media viewer to compare features of the sample withnormal histological features to highlight pathological diagnoses.

In embodiments, researchers may interact with collaboration managementsystems through the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providingvertical market integration. For example, clinicians using a product ina clinical trial or after its approval may be kept informed ofdevelopments during laboratory research on that same product. Long-termanimal studies performed in the lab on a product like Vioxx, forexample, may inform clinicians who are involved in clinical trials sothat they may pay particular attention to findings that may not havepreviously appeared relevant.

In embodiments, researchers may interact with collaboration managementsystems associated with special formatting and/or display properties. Inresponse to a researcher's query from one clinical trial site, forexample, data for her own patients may be personalized while data forother clinical trial patients may be anonymized. As another example,researchers in blinded or double-blinded studies may not be able to viewpatient information that discloses the treatment regimen each patient isreceiving.

In embodiments, researchers may interact with collaboration managementsystems having special identification properties, or having restrictedor conditional access properties. Such properties may allow for patientdata to be blinded, for example, or may allow for patient data to bedepersonalized. Researchers who also provide clinical care to a patientpopulation may have access to individual patient identifiers, forexample, while other researchers may be restricted from accessing thisinformation. Or experimental results may be viewed anonymously by trialsponsors who click on the subject identification number.

As a further example, in certain embodiments all meaningful patientidentifiers may be held in a syndicated pod independent of otherclinical data, where a researcher would need an access key consistentwith a particular access level. In this way, information that has beenblinded to researcher and patient alike may be sequestered in asyndicated pod only to be accessed under certain conditions. Therandomization results that contain information about who received thestudy drug and who received the placebo may be held in a syndicated pod,for example, accessible only to certain monitors if a predeterminedpattern of adverse events or of overwhelming drug success becomesevident. The designated monitors who can access the data pod and “crackthe code” may be determined in advance and provided with appropriatecredentials. Similarly, the circumstances under which the randomizationcode should be broken may be determined in advance and incorporated intothe conditions allowing access to the sequestered data pod.

In embodiments, researchers may interact with collaboration managementsystems associated with database functions that permit the data qualityto be verified, provide for transformation of data, enable searching,filtering or clustering of data, or categorizing the data intohierarchies, interrelationships, interrelated groups and the like. Forexample, database functions applied to collaboration management systemsmay allow for the identification of adverse event patterns from acollection of trial sites or for review of the demographics of clinicaltrial enrollees. Database functions applied to data collected by a groupof researchers may facilitate ordering the data for subsequentstatistical analysis. In one example, syndicated data banking may permitnon-centralized storing of multi-site data. Database functions appliedto the banked data may prepare the experimental results for subsequentanalysis and publication.

In embodiments, researchers may interact with collaboration managementsystems associated with semantic rules that may enable the creation ofmetadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadata enrichment,interpretation or translation of syndicated collaboration managementsystems, as well as permit the creation of knowledge structures (e.g.,using OPML) and the use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like. Use ofmetadata for syndicated collaboration management systems may permit, forexample, the retrieval of all test results of a certain type forpatients within a clinical trial. All kidney function tests performed onsubjects in a clinical trial, for example, could be retrieved inaccordance with semantic rules that permit the identification of testsof all types that relate to renal function (such as blood testsincluding blood urea nitrogen, serum creatinine, serum potassium, andthe like, urine tests including urinalysis and urine sediment analysisand creatinine clearance studies, kidney ultrasounds and radiologicalstudies like intravenous pyelogram). Retrieving a variety of data thatpertain to a particular organ may allow the early identification ofpatterns indicating the organ to be damaged by the study drug. Asanother example, metadata applied to study results may indicate whenabnormal results have been obtained, i.e., a test result that is outsidethe parameters of what is considered normal. A surveillance monitor maythen retrieve via RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream or RSS channel anupdate on abnormal results from all test sites as a clinical trialprogresses, allowing her to identify problematic trends.

In embodiments, researchers may interact with collaboration managementsystems to which others may subscribe, and researchers may publish theirresults within the collaboration management systems. For example, asponsor of a clinical trial may be able to subscribe to an RSS feed 202,web feed, RSS stream or RSS channel that sets forth the progress of thetrial from multiple sites, including enrollment statistics, images ofsigned informed consent documents, and data from individual anonymizedsubjects. As another example, clinicians at trial sites may be able tosubscribe to an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream or RSS channel thatprovides updated data from bench studies or animal studies that arerelevant to the product being tested clinically. As a further example,an individual researcher may subscribe to a RSS feed 202, web feed, RSSstream or RSS channel that sets forth data obtained by other researchersat different locations. Such subscription may make collaborationpossible among individuals under the same institutional umbrella. Withproper access restrictions limiting users and limiting access to datasets, such subscription may also permit collaboration among individualsfrom different institutions or from different corporations.

In embodiments, the collaboration management systems may be associatedwith information that may provide for further processing and managementof the data. For example, the data from a clinical trial may furtherprovide information about the site from which it was obtained, thedemographics of the anonymized patient, the date when the test wasperformed, etc. Thus, the data may provide for further aggregation,republication and the like.

In embodiments, researchers may interact with collaboration managementsystems within an infrastructure 416 that provides for data security,authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSS feeds 202,web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pinging technology,and/or other communications. Such an infrastructure may protect vitalproprietary data during multisite clinical trials or within a largeorganization. Such an infrastructure may also protect patientconfidentiality during clinical trials. Moreover, such an infrastructuremay permit notifications to be delivered to appropriate individuals, forexample, notification of sponsors when an adverse event occurs, ornotification of other researchers.

In embodiments, researchers, research assistants, research analysts,report drafters, sponsors and data collectors (collectively termed“authors”) may interact with syndicated authorship management systemsvia syndicated authorship information obtained through an RSS feed 202,web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel, to collaboration in thecollection, exchange and reporting of data or other information obtainedduring research. The syndicated authorship information may involveresearch-related information and all varieties of experimental andobservational data such as basic scientific data, social scientificdata, epidemiological or statistical data, preclinical data, clinicaldata and the like, alone or in combination with narratives includingdiscussions, descriptions, analyses or other reports pertaining to theinformation and/or data. Relevant authorship systems may include systemsfor reporting experimental methods and materials, systems for preparingmanuscripts, systems for preparing presentations, systems for preparingregulatory submissions and systems for preparing proposals.

In embodiments, the saving, storing, merging, retrieval and publicationof syndicated authorship management information through RSS feed 202,web feed, RSS stream or RSS channel may be associated with anapplication 406 consisting of a client-side program. The client-sideprogram may be formatted to operate on client devices such as a desktopcomputer, a laptop computer, a pocket personal computer, a cellularphone, Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like. The client-side program may be an individual one,such as a Palm Pilot scheduler, or an enterprise one for the input andmanagement of research-related information, data and narrative. As anexample, a client-side program and device may permit input, analysis anddiscussion of data obtained by a group of researchers conductingindependent experiments, thereby permitting multicenter collaborativereporting. As another example, a client-side program and device maypermit data input by one researcher and statistical analysis by anotherresearcher. As a further example, a client-side program and device maypermit collaboration among researchers on a manuscript draft undergoingrevisions in real-time.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with the syndicated authorship management systems maybe associated with an aggregator 210 to track updates. In this way,research information may be continuously updated, so that newinformation becomes available to all collaborators. As an example,comments on a manuscript may be readily collected so that the primaryauthor can integrate the input from her collaborators.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated authorship management systems may beassociated with a content management system that may provide summariesof the syndicated data available, dates associated with the syndicateddata, links to access the full, non-summarized data, parametersassociated with research information, and the like. In certainembodiments, the content management system may include a proprietaryprogram for maintaining the records of a research program. Such aprogram may be responsive to the requirements by regulatory agencies sothat the research data is maintained in a format that is readilyaccessible for regulatory review.

In embodiments, researchers, research assistants, research analysts,report drafters, sponsors and data collectors may interact withsyndicated authorship management systems through the use of aRSS-enabled application 406 providing social networking. As an example,an epidemiological researcher may collect data from a number ofgeographically dispersed investigators and provide them comments on thedesign of their data collection methods. Through this interplay, thecollection methods may be improved so that the research results are moremeaningful. As another example, collaborators on a report forpublication may each work on a particular segment of the report andelicit comments from the other collaborators in real time. Versions andrevisions may be available to the entire collaboration team as eachauthor works on his or her segment.

In embodiments, researchers, research assistants, research analysts,report drafters, sponsors and data collectors may interact withsyndicated authorship management systems through the use of anapplication providing a media viewer. For example, a RSS item may referto an image source, such as a digital photomicrograph or a digitalphotograph, and may specify a viewer for the source image that isavailable through the registry. In operation, a client with appropriatepermissions may view the image (also as managed, e.g., through themetadata for the enhanced syndication system), may retrieve theappropriate viewer service from the registry and may apply the viewer toview the source image.

In embodiments, researchers, research assistants, research analysts,report drafters, sponsors and data collectors may interact withsyndicated authorship management systems through the use of anapplication providing a user interface 700 for viewing informationrelated to a particular research project. For example, a customized userinterface may be available to all members of a collaborative team sothat each researcher may have access to materials like data fromdifferent clinical trial sites, relevant journal articles or otherreferences that are identified during the course of the research, andadministrative documents pertaining to the research project. A client102 may, in response to user input such as clicking on a title of anitem in the user interface 700, retrieve the underlying item from thecontent source 204 as indicated by the arrow 208.

In embodiments, researchers, research assistants, research analysts,report drafters, sponsors and data collectors may interact withsyndicated authorship management systems through the use of anapplication providing vertical market integration.

In embodiments, researchers, research assistants, research analysts,report drafters, sponsors and data collectors may interact withsyndicated authorship management systems that are associated withspecial formatting and/or display properties.

In embodiments, researchers, research assistants, research analysts,report drafters, sponsors and data collectors may interact withsyndicated authorship management systems that are associated withspecial identification properties.

In embodiments, researchers, research assistants, research analysts,report drafters, sponsors and data collectors may interact withsyndicated authorship management systems that are associated withrestricted or conditional access properties. A sponsor may have accessto all information produced during a series of clinical trials, forexample, while the individual researchers are restricted to accessingthe data obtained from their individual trials. The sponsor may decidewhen the primary investigator or the group of investigators may reviewall data, in anticipation of producing a published report of the study.

In embodiments, researchers, research assistants, research analysts,report drafters, sponsors and data collectors may interact withsyndicated authorship management systems associated with databasefunctions that permit the data quality to be verified, provide fortransformation of data, enable searching, filtering or clustering ofdata, or categorizing the data into hierarchies, interrelationships,interrelated groups and the like. Applying database functions toresearch data from a number of research sites may permit easier analysisof the data and easier access to the analyzed data by collaboratingauthors.

In embodiments, researchers, research assistants, research analysts,report drafters, sponsors and data collectors may interact withsyndicated authorship management systems associated with semantic rulesthat may enable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may alsoprovide for metadata enrichment, interpretation or translation ofsyndicated authorship management systems, as well as permit the creationof knowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary,thesaurus or the like. Use of metadata for syndicated authorshipmanagement systems may permit the ready identification of data trends bya collaborating group of authors.

In embodiments, researchers, research assistants, research analysts,report drafters, sponsors and data collectors may interact withsyndicated authorship management systems to which others may subscribe.For example, registrants for a conference may be able to subscribe to anRSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream or RSS channel that regularlyretrieves and updates accepted submissions to the conference, includingslides, video, audio, and data to be included in conferencepresentations. As another example, a collaborating group of authors maycirculate their preliminary report to a network of peers coincident withor in advance of formal submission for publication.

In embodiments, the authorship management systems may be furtherassociated with information that may provide for the management of thedata. For example, the information may list the source of the data in awork of authorship, the date on which it was last updated, etc. Thus,the data may provide for further aggregation, republication and thelike. A group of researchers, for example, who has identified noteworthytrends in their investigations may publish the series through thesyndicated authorship management system so that other subscribingscientists in the field may learn from their experience. While suchpublication does not provide the quality control of a peer-reviewedscientific journal, it may offer more immediate access to the earliestresearch findings.

*[Collaborative Research—Q29-34] In embodiments, researchers, researchassistants, research analysts, report drafters, sponsors and datacollectors may interact with syndicated authorship management systemswithin an infrastructure 416 that provides for data security,authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSS feeds 202,web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pinging technology,and/or other communications. Such an infrastructure may, for example,provide for alerts when statistically significant findings have beenrecorded, or when a segment of a research report is available for otherauthors to review.

In embodiments, researchers and interested third parties such asreviewers, regulators, patients, advocacy groups, sponsors,research-supporting institutions and the like, may interact withsyndicated research reporting systems via syndicated research reportdata obtained through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel, to facilitate communications between the researchers and theinterested third parties. Enhanced communication between researchers andreviewers may advantageously streamline publication of research results.Enhanced communication between researchers and regulators mayadvantageously expedite regulatory approval of drugs and devices.Enhanced communication between researchers and patients and advocacygroups advantageously may increase scientists' awareness of communityneeds and may educate members of the community about research trends.Enhanced communication between researchers and sponsors andresearch-supporting institutions may advantageously increase the fundingavailable for a particular research endeavor. The syndicated researchreporting data may include submissions for peer review, submissions forregulatory approval, disclosures to patient or community groups, reportsto business sponsors, applications for grants, requests for researchproposals, requests for grant applications and the like.

In embodiments, the saving, storing, merging, retrieval and publicationof syndicated research reporting information through RSS feed 202, webfeed, RSS stream or RSS channel may be associated with an application406 consisting of a client-side program. The client-side program may beformatted to operate on client devices such as a desktop computer, alaptop computer, a pocket personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like. The client-side program may be an individual one,such as a Palm Pilot scheduler, or an enterprise one for the input andmanagement of data, documents, or comments.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with the syndicated research reporting systems may beassociated with an aggregator 210 to track updates. In this way, aresearcher may track his grant application through the review processand see what comments, suggestions or criticisms have been entered bydifferent reviewers. This real-time feedback may allow him to reviseexperimental protocols or change his application strategy so that hisproposals are more likely to be favorably received.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated research reporting systems may beassociated with a content management system that may provide summariesof the syndicated data available, dates associated with the syndicateddata, links to access the full, non-summarized data, parametersassociated with research information, and the like. Research reportingsystems may draw from other sources of syndicated data, so that theyinclude references to the scientific literature or cross-references toother studies or data submissions by the same researchers. For example,a submission to a regulatory agency may include links to full,non-summarized sets of preclinical toxicology and pharmacology data inan easy-to-access format. A syndicated research reporting system maymake data more accessible to reviewers and allow them to comment on thedata more rapidly. Furthermore, syndicated research reporting systemsmay provide customized information for a query.

In embodiments, researchers and interested third parties such asreviewers, regulators, patients, advocacy groups, sponsors,research-supporting institutions and the like, may interact withsyndicated research reporting systems through the use of a RSS-enabledapplication 406 providing social networking. The regulator, for example,may review some early data and may comment to the sponsor. The sponsor,in turn, may provide this feedback to the researchers, who willthemselves provide response to the regulator's comments. Syndicatedresearch reporting systems may establish easily-navigated channels ofcommunication among the parties involved in designing the trial,submitting the data and evaluating the data for regulatory approval.

In embodiments, researchers and interested third parties such asreviewers, regulators, patients, advocacy groups, sponsors,research-supporting institutions and the like, may interact withsyndicated research reporting systems through the use of an RSS-enabledapplication 406 providing a user interface for viewing data, records,and the like. For example, a client 102 may be able to click on an iconrepresenting a grant application in the user interface 700 to retrievethe application and all supporting data from the content source 204 asindicated by an arrow 208. A user interface 700 may be designed, forexample, to allow collaborating authors to collect documents, data andanalytic reports for an article. As another example, a user interface700 may permit the authors of a submitted publication to track itsreview progress and to access reviews and comments as they are entered.

In embodiments, researchers and interested third parties such asreviewers, regulators, patients, advocacy groups, sponsors,research-supporting institutions and the like, may interact withsyndicated research reporting systems through the use of an applicationproviding a media viewer.

In embodiments, researchers and interested third parties such asreviewers, regulators, patients, advocacy groups, sponsors,research-supporting institutions and the like, may interact withsyndicated research reporting systems associated with special formattingand/or display properties.

In embodiments, researchers and interested third parties such asreviewers, regulators, patients, advocacy groups, sponsors,research-supporting institutions and the like, may interact withsyndicated research reporting systems associated with specialidentification properties. Reviewers, for example, may rely on specialidentification properties that allow them to remain anonymous whileinteracting with the researcher. In embodiments, researchers andinterested third parties such as reviewers, regulators, patients,advocacy groups, sponsors, research-supporting institutions and thelike, may interact with syndicated research reporting systems associatedwith restricted or conditional access properties. Certain reviewers of agrant proposal may have access only to certain portions of it, forexample, so as to preserve confidentiality of submitted materials.Certain portions of a regulatory submission may be viewed by regulators,for example, but may not be generally available to the public.

In embodiments, researchers and interested third parties such asreviewers, regulators, patients, advocacy groups, sponsors,research-supporting institutions and the like, may interact withsyndicated research reporting systems associated with database functionsthat permit the data quality to be verified, provide for transformationof data, enable searching, filtering or clustering of data, orcategorizing the data into hierarchies, interrelationships, interrelatedgroups and the like. For example, database functions applied tosyndicated research reporting systems may allow a reviewer for aregulatory agency to reorganize the data that has been submitted to seewhat other patterns emerge.

In embodiments, researchers and interested third parties such asreviewers, regulators, patients, advocacy groups, sponsors,research-supporting institutions and the like, may interact withsyndicated research reporting systems associated with semantic rulesthat may enable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may alsoprovide for metadata enrichment, interpretation or translation ofsyndicated information management systems, as well as permit thecreation of knowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of adictionary, thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, researchers and interested third parties such asreviewers, regulators, patients, advocacy groups, sponsors,research-supporting institutions and the like, may interact withsyndicated research reporting systems to which others may subscribe.Patients who have participated in a clinical trial, for example, maywish to track the regulatory submission pertaining to the trial product.In embodiments, the research reporting systems may be further associatedwith information that may provide for the management of the reporting,or that provide for further aggregation, republication and the like.

While the research reporting systems discussed so far have beeninaugurated by a researcher seeking to interact with a reviewer or otherthird party, research reporting systems may also be set in motion by thethird party who wishes to interact with subscribing researchers. Aresearch-supporting institution such as the NIH, for example, may pushrequests for proposals to relevant clinicians or academics in asyndicated feed. Similarly, a research-supporting institution maypublish to subscribing researchers descriptions of funded proposals ordescriptions of earmarked fund allocations. A research reporting systemmay permit response by the researcher to communications initiated by athird party such as a research-supporting institution.

In embodiments, researchers and interested third parties such asreviewers, regulators, patients, advocacy groups, sponsors,research-supporting institutions and the like, may interact withsyndicated research reporting systems within an infrastructure 416 thatprovides for data security, authentication, management of the trafficcreated by the RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels,logging and pinging technology, and/or other communications. Forexample, a research reporting system may permit notifying theresearchers when a regulatory submission passes through initial review,or when a regulatory submission has an identified deficiency.

While the illustrative embodiments herein have described syndicatedcollaboration management, authorship management and research reportingsystems as applied to scientific and clinical research, it will beunderstood by those of ordinary skill that syndicated collaborationmanagement, authorship management and research reporting systems (andthe other disclosures provided herein) may be applied to research in allscientific disciplines, including but not limited to psychology,sociology, anthropology, ethnography, oceanography, ecology and othersocial, physical or biological investigations. In addition, those ofordinary skill will further appreciate that syndicated collaborationmanagement, authorship management and research reporting systems may beapplied to collaborative non-scientific research, for example in theliberal arts.

Referring to FIG. 19, the syndicated management system 1902 may be atime management system, a time utilization management system, a medicalinformation management system, a business systems management system, acollaboration systems management system, an authorship management systemand/or a research reporting management system, such as described herein.The syndicated management system 1902 function may be associated with ahealthcare environment, healthcare practice environment, researchenvironment, medical environment and/or another environment. The dataand/or information, including syndicated data and/or information, mayoriginate on a network 110 or may originate from a content source 204through a data feed 202 or directly. An aggregator 210 may be employedas described above. Users 1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, mayview and/or receive information from and/or send information to and/orinteract with the syndicated management system 1902 directly or throughan application/interface/other 1308. The users 1304 may also interactwith each other. The application/interface/other 1308 may be aclient-side program, such as the healthcare program discussed herein, acontent management system, a social networking application, a userinterface, such as user interface 700, 800 and/or 900, an application inconnection with a media viewer, a media viewer and/or an applicationproviding for vertical market integration, such as described herein. Theapplication/interface/other 1308 may, for example, be deployed as aservice in a services oriented architecture or using the othertechniques described above with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certainembodiments the arrows of FIG. 19 may be data feeds, such as data feed202.

Referring to FIG. 20, the syndicated management system 1902 may be atime management system, a time utilization management system, a medicalinformation management system, a business systems management system, acollaboration systems management system, an authorship management systemand/or a research reporting management system, such as described herein.The syndicated management system 1902 function may be associated with ahealthcare environment, healthcare practice environment, researchenvironment, medical environment and/or another environment. The dataand/or information, including syndicated data and/or information, mayoriginate on a network 110 or may originate from a content source 204through a data feed 202 or directly. An aggregator 210 may be employedas described above. Users 1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, mayview and/or receive information from and/or send information to and/orinteract with the syndicated management system 1902 directly or througha database function 1402. The database function 1402 may also interactdirectly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 mayalso interact with each other. The database function 1402 may be adatabase function as described herein, such as related to data quality,data transformation, searching, filtering, clustering, a search engine,information relationships, hierarchical relationships andcategorization, such as described herein. The database function 1402may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 20may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

Referring to FIG. 21, the syndicated management system 1902 may be atime management system, a time utilization management system, a medicalinformation management system, a business systems management system, acollaboration systems management system, an authorship management systemand/or a research reporting management system, as described herein. Thesyndicated management system 1902 function may be associated with ahealthcare environment, healthcare practice environment, researchenvironment, medical environment and/or another environment. The dataand/or information, including syndicated data and/or information, mayoriginate on a network 110 or may originate from a content source 204through a data feed 202 or directly. An aggregator 210 may be employedas described above. Users 1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, mayview and/or receive information from and/or send information to and/orinteract with the syndicated management system 1902 directly or througha semantic facility 1502. The semantic facility 1502 may also interactdirectly with the syndicated management system 1902. The users 1304 mayalso interact with each other. The semantic facility 1502 may provide orbe related to semantic rules, metadata creation, metadata enrichment,interpretation of aggregated data, such as syndicated data/information1302, translation of aggregated data, such as syndicateddata/information 1302, creation of knowledge structures, a dictionaryand/or a thesaurus, such as described herein. The semantic facility 1502may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 21may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

Referring to FIG. 22, the syndicated management system 1902 may be atime management system, a time utilization management system, a medicalinformation management system, a business systems management system, acollaboration systems management system, an authorship management systemand/or a research reporting management system, as described herein. Thesyndicated management system 1902 function may be associated with ahealthcare environment, healthcare practice environment, researchenvironment, medical environment and/or another environment. The dataand/or information, including syndicated data and/or information, mayoriginate on a network 110 or may originate from a content source 204through a data feed 202 or directly. An aggregator 210 may be employedas described above. Users 1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, mayview and/or receive information from and/or send information to and/orinteract with the syndicated management system 1902 directly or througha syndication facility 1602. The syndication facility 1602 may alsointeract directly with the syndicated management system 1902. The users1304 may also interact with each other. The syndication facility 1602may publish, subscribe to, aggregate and republish aggregated data, suchas syndicated data/information 1302, such as described herein. Thesyndication facility 1602 may also manage syndication information 1302,such as described herein. The syndication facility 1602 may, forexample, be deployed as a service in a services oriented architecture orusing the other techniques described above with reference to FIGS. 4 and5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 22 may be data feeds, suchas data feed 202. A user 1304 may also publish, republish and/orsubscribe to a content source 204, data feed 202, aggregator 210 and/orsyndication facility 1602.

Referring to FIG. 23, the syndicated management system 1902 may be atime management system, a time utilization management system, a medicalinformation management system, a business systems management system, acollaboration systems management system, an authorship management systemand/or a research reporting management system. The syndicated managementsystem 1902 function may be associated with a healthcare environment,healthcare practice environment, research environment, medicalenvironment and/or another environment. The data and/or information,including syndicated data and/or information, may originate on a network110 or may originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202or directly. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view and/or receiveinformation from and/or send information to and/or interact with thesyndicated management system 1902 directly or through an infrastructure1702. The infrastructure 1702 may also interact directly with thesyndicated management system 1902. The users 1304 may also interact witheach other. The infrastructure 1702 may provide or be related tosecurity, authentication, traffic management, logging, pinging and/orcommunications, such as described herein. The infrastructure 1702 may,for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 23may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

Referring to FIG. 24, the syndicated management system 1902 may be atime management system, a time utilization management system, a medicalinformation management system, a business systems management system, acollaboration systems management system, an authorship management systemand/or a research reporting management system, as described herein. Thesyndicated management system 1902 function may be associated with ahealthcare environment, healthcare practice environment, researchenvironment, medical environment and/or another environment. The dataand/or information, including syndicated data and/or information, mayoriginate on a network 110 or may originate from a content source 204through a data feed 202 or directly. An aggregator 210 may be employedas described above. The infrastructure 1702 may also interact directlywith the syndicated management system 1902. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The syndicated management system 1902 may beassociated with special properties 1802. The special properties 1802 maybe related to formatting, display, identification, de-identification,transactions, restricted access and/or conditional access, such asdescribed herein. The special properties 1802 may also be associatedwith a service application 406, 408, 410, 412, 414 and/or 416. Incertain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 24 may be data feeds, such asdata feed 202.

An important component of improving health care quality is translatingresearch evidence to standard medical practice, and integrating otheruseful information into clinical care to assist decision making. Manywell-documented, effective therapies remain underutilized in spite ofclinical trial results published in respected medical journals andextensive media attention. For example, despite the documented clinicalefficacy of ACE inhibitors within multiple disease classes, the drugsremain under-prescribed in the clinical populations for which they areindicated. Documented evidence of an effective therapy does notimmediately lead to its adoption into clinical practice. Adoption ofeffective therapies may be slowed by physician-, institution-, andpatient-based barriers.

One of the many challenges of a physician's practice concerns medicaldecision making. At its most basic, medical decision making refers tomaking the decision about which medical treatment is most appropriate(or inappropriate) for a patient at a point in time, given the currentmedical evidence and the patient's unique demographic and clinicalcircumstances. The difficulties of medical decision making stem, inpart, from the multitude of patient factors influencing treatmentchoice, the continually evolving nature of medical treatments, theirunderstanding, and therapeutic advances, and the time stresses ofphysicians that make it increasingly difficult for them to analyze newmedical studies and integrate new medical findings into their patientpractices. For example, in the course of a standard twenty minutecheck-up with a patient, a cardiologist must evaluate a patient's vitalsigns, inquire about “how the patient has been feeling,” inquire aboutother health ailments (e.g. disease comorbidities), ensure that newmedications don't need to be prescribed, that current medication dosagesdon't need to be altered, that other physicians have not prescribedmedications that may have negative interactions with the patient's heartmedications, have a working knowledge of recent developments in medicalresearch that may have a bearing on a patient with the demographic andclinical profile of the current patient, and so on. The information loadis substantial. Often physicians must, knowingly or unknowingly, takeinformational shortcuts in the course of care. For example, acardiologist may be confident that Medication A is indicated for thepatient, but may not recall a study from the New England Journal ofMedicine demonstrating that the effects of Medication A aresignificantly improved when it is taken in conjunction with MedicationB. The patient is conscientiously prescribed only Medication A by thecardiologist and, as a result of not receiving Medication B as well,achieves sub-optimal healthcare outcomes due to the physician'sinformational limitation. Compounding the problem is that the physicianmay not have an opportunity to realize the error and, thus, willreplicate it with other patients.

Physicians and their support institutions, such as hospitals andacademic centers, have tried to narrow the information gap in a numberof ways. Many institutions are moving to the electronic medical chartand similar electronic medical storage systems. The electronic medicalchart is designed to move an institution from a paper-based recordsmanagement system to a digital model in which records are more easilysearched, stored, merged, and retrieved. If a physician can key a queryfor an informational element she seeks and pull it up on a screen, thenshe doesn't have to sort through stacks of paper records looking for apatient's current list of medications or the hundreds of other dataelements she may need.

In spite of the improvement of the electronic medical record over thepaper-based system, it still has many limitations. For one, it isgenerally a relational database-type product that is an isolated storageunit, most often within a single health care system. Thus the electronicmedical record does not retrieve information from outside a giveninstitution. If a patient is on vacation, becomes ill, and is forced tovisit a hospital away from home, the hospital he visits with anelectronic data retrieval ability will very likely not have access tothe patient's medical record at the institution(s) in the patient'shometown. Likewise, other data sources must be referenced for other of aphysician's information needs. Medication lists may be stored in aninstitution's formulary database. New research findings may have to beaccessed via the Internet and a database, such as Medline, and so forth.In sum, the sources of medical data are often grouped according to theinternal consistencies and similarities of the data alone, rather thangrouped by the unique needs of physicians and institutions in order tomake optimal medical decisions that promote beneficial health outcomes.The syndication technologies described in detail herein provide methodsand systems for interacting with healthcare information on the basis ofthe needs of physicians and institutions to make informed medicaldecisions.

As with physicians and institutions, patients need information to makemedical decisions and many currently lack the resources for makingeducated decisions regarding treatment options, trade-offs betweenmedications, and the like. A well-informed patient is able toparticipate in the decisions affecting his medical well-being andparticipate in shared decision-making with his physician, rather thansimply passively entrusting his care entirely to a doctor's judgment.Shared decision making inserts patients' preferences and values into thedecision making process and is preferred by patients. Shared-decisionmaking may enhance a patient's understanding of his medical condition,provide him with realistic expectations of healthcare outcomes followingtreatment, and improve patient satisfaction. Patient compliance withtherapy may also improve when a patient and physician participate in aprocess of shared decision-making.

Some of the circumstances in which shared decision-making is mostimportant include (i) when trade-offs exist between near-term andlong-term outcomes, (ii) when there is a small risk of an extremelynegative outcome, (iii) when treatment options appear to have minimaldifferences, (iv) when there are dramatic differences in the kinds ofoutcomes offered by treatment options, (v) when there are majordifferences in the probabilities of complications, (vi) when a patientis risk-averse, (vii) when a patient is risk insensitive, and (viii)when a patient places extreme value on certain outcomes.

Physicians often present patients information in qualitative terms(e.g., “There is a very good chance that, with a lumpectomy, the cancerwill not return and you will return to a healthy life.”) despiteevidence that patients are better able to more accurately remember factspresented in numeric, probabilistic terms (e.g., “A woman of your agecan expect an X % chance that cancer will return within 10 years, and anX % 10-year survival rate following surgery.”). Thus, the use ofinformation to assist patient decision-making should, at minimum,include numeric outcome estimates. Estimates may inform patients ofprocedural risks, possible side effects, probable outcomes, andpotential trade-offs between treatment options. One likely reason thatphysicians don't always present such information to patients is that toremember such a vast quantity of numeric information as it applies tothe many patients that a physician cares for, each with their own uniqueclinical circumstances, is not mentally possible. To stop in the middleof a time-limited office visit to do the necessary research online tocompute such numeric estimates may be equally unrealistic.

Apart from the direct health benefits that may result from informedpatients participating in shared decision making with their physicians,better informed patients are also able to make medical decisions thatare more congruent with the outcome(s) they most desire. This level ofcongruence is likely to improve patients' satisfaction with theirhealthcare that, in turn, has many economic and regulatory benefits forphysicians, healthcare institutions, and insurers. For example, somesurgical procedures may improve patients' survival, but at a cost of thepatient enduring a painful intervention and lengthy, difficult recoveryperiod. A patient presented with this information may be able to choosethe option that is most in line with her wishes and better accept theclinical consequences that flow from this decision.

The syndication technologies described in detail herein provide methodsand systems for interacting with healthcare information on the basis ofthe needs of patients to make informed medical decisions.

Healthcare data that may improve the quality of medical decision makingcome from many sources, including, patients' medical records, records ofphysician performance, standards of care that are published byregulatory and other groups, billing information, epidemiologicinformation on the complications, events, side effects and the like thatare associated with medical procedures, devices, medications, and thelike. In spite of the usefulness of this information for improvingmedical decision making, it often exists in formats that are notconducive to easy retrieval by interested parties in the course ofpatient care. For example, the American Heart Association may publishguidelines for optimal treatment of hypertension in paper and electronicformat. However, it would be unwieldy for a physician to carry papercopies of all relevant guidelines and standards pertaining to herpatient population, and the electronic versions are likely to be websitepostings, as opposed to more readily searchable electronic formats. Withsyndicated data, a physician, institution, patient or other interestedparty may create unique sets (i.e. feeds) of metadata comprised of dataelements from multiple sources that are associated principally by auser-defined element (e.g. a patient's name, a disease state, a clinicalspecialty). This specificity of data retrieval, coupled with thenon-centralized storage/retrieval processes of syndicated data, may makeit well-suited for providing informational support for medical decisionmaking.

In embodiments, a physician's, or other health care provider's, RSS feed202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel may be configured by thephysician, institution for whom the physician is employed, a third-partyenterprise managing physician's accounts, or the like. Thisconfiguration may be based at least in part on the physician's clinicalarea of specialization (e.g. cardiology, endocrinologist, generalpractitioner), the institution within which the physician practices(e.g. solo practice, physician group practice, hospital, academiccenter), the clinical mix of the physician's patients (e.g. elderlycardiology patients with atherosclerosis, minors with autism), theICD-10 codes of the patients currently under the physician's care (e.g.“1.8.6 (H40-H42)”=Glaucoma), patients' diagnostic related groups(DRG's), the geographic location of the physician's practice (e.g. USzipcode, “Southern, rural America,” Mexico), the medication-prescribinghistory of the physician (e.g. Beta-blocker, Prozac, Zocor), theinterventions performed by the physician (e.g. angioplasty,colonoscopy), organizations to which the physician holds a currentmembership (e.g. the American Medical Association), medical journals towhich the physician subscribes (e.g. The Lancet), medical boards fromwhich the physician has certification, continuing medical educationevents that physician has attended, and so forth.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may save, store, merge, retrieve, andpublish the records of a physician's patients in a syndicated format toenable interested persons to retrieve the clinical patient data throughan RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel. The records mayinclude patients' demographic information, such as, age, sex, race,religion, area code, home address, work address, billing address, familyinformation (e.g., mother's maiden name), emergency contacts,birthplace, driver's license number, employer, position, and the like.The records may include patients' historical clinical information, suchas, medication histories and dosages, allergies, family medical history,past interventions received, major illnesses, congenital abnormalities,previous healthcare providers and their contact information, pastinsurance information, and the like. The records may include patients'current clinical information, such as, disease status, comorbidities,vital signs, relevant clinical test summaries, allergies, currentmedications and associated dosages, functional status, other healthcareproviders caring for a patient and the associated contact information,and the like.

In embodiments, the saving, storing, merging, retrieval, and publicationof patients' data through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with an application 406 consisting of aclient-side program. The client-side program may be formatted to operateon client devices such as, a desktop computer, laptop computer, “pocket”personal computer, a cellular phone, Blackberry, personal digitalassistant, or other SMS text-enabled device, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to save, store, merge, retrieve, and publish patients' records maybe associated with an aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to save, store, merge, retrieve, and publish patients' records maybe associated with a content management system that may providesummaries of the syndicated data available, dates associated with thesyndicated data, links to access the full, non-summarized data, and thelike.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may save, store, merge, retrieve, andpublish syndicated patient data through the use of an application 406providing social networking. For example, through social networking aphysician may be able to communicate and share syndicated data withother healthcare providers with whom the physician shares care for apatient, a clinical specialty, clinical population type, and the like.The clinical factors of relevance to physicians who seek to shareclinical data may be published with detailed tags to provide narrowlytailored or easily filtered RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, orRSS channels for ongoing data sharing with colleagues. Such a processmay allow physicians who care for a common patient to more efficientlyshare the patient's data and improve cross-specialty collaboration inpatient care. For example, a cardiologist may be unaware of very recentvisits that one of her patients has made to other healthcare providers.With a syndicated data store associated with this patient, a visit bythe patient the prior day to his endocrinologist and any associated dataentering his medical record could be made available to the cardiologistfor retrieval via RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelwithout the delay associated with paper records or currentrelational-type database. Such a process may provide for physicians toconduct virtual case studies with colleagues around the world and learnclinical details, treatment strategies and the like in a more efficientand less costly manner than the traditional face-to-face physician casestudy meetings.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may interact with syndicated patientdata through the use of an application 406 providing a user interface700 for viewing data, records, and the like. For example, a client 102may, in response to user input such as clicking on a title of an item inthe user interface 700, retrieve the underlying item from the contentsource 204 as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may interact with syndicated patientdata through the use of an application 406 providing a media viewer. Forexample, an RSS item may refer to an image source, such as an MRI imagein a medical record from a hospital, and may specify a viewer for thesource image that is available through the registry. In operation, aclient (e.g. a physician) with appropriate permissions to view the image(also as managed, e.g., through the metadata for the enhancedsyndication system), may retrieve the appropriate viewer service fromthe registry, and apply the viewer to view the source image.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may interact with syndicated patientdata through the use of an application 406 providing vertical marketintegration. For example, as hospital-physicians update the medicationsand dosages of their patient population following clinical visits, thissyndicated data may be provided to the hospital's pharmacy via an RSSfeed 202 and may permit the pharmacy to more efficiency conductordering, inventory management, and the like.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may interact with syndicated patientdata that is associated with database functions that may permit the dataquality to be verified, provide for transformation of the patients'data, enable searching, filtering, or clustering the patient data, orcategorizing the data into hierarchies, interrelationships, interrelatedgroups, and the like.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may interact with syndicated patientdata that is associated with semantic rules 412 that enable the creationof intra-, or inter-patient, -clinical state, -institution, etc.metadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadata enrichment,interpretation or translation of patient data, as well as permit thecreation of knowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of adictionary, thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may interact with syndicated patientdata to which others may publish and/or subscribe. For example, within apediatric physician group all physicians may be able to publish and/orsubscribe to an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel,“influenza” that regularly updates and retrieves information from acrossthe entire practice on rates of childhood influenza that are being seenand treated by the physicians within the practice.

In embodiments, the syndicated patient data may be further associatedwith information that may provide for the management of the data. Forexample, the data may list the author of the data, the date on which itwas authored, etc. Thus, the data may provide for further aggregation,republication, and the like.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may interact with syndicated patientdata within an infrastructure 416 that provides for data security,authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSS feeds 202,web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pinging technology,and/or other communications.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may interact with syndicated patientdata that is associated with special formatting and/or displayproperties.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may interact with syndicated patientdata that is associated with special identification properties ortransaction related properties.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may interact with syndicated patientdata that is associated with restricted or conditional accessproperties.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may aggregate the records of aphysician's patients in a syndicated format to enable interested personsto retrieve the all pertinent patient data through an RSS feed 202, webfeed, RSS stream, or RSS channel. For example, a patient may havelaboratory tests taken at one facility, meet with a primary carephysician at another facility, receive a surgical intervention at athird facility, and so on. By aggregating the RSS feeds 202, web feeds,RSS streams, or RSS channels associated with each location of contactwith the patient, all interested healthcare providers and institutionsmay have access to the full complement of a patient's data. The recordsmay include laboratory test values. The records may include records fromprior healthcare providers and institutions. The records may includepatients' demographic information, such as, age, sex, race, religion,area code, home address, work address, billing address, familyinformation (e.g., mother's maiden name), emergency contacts,birthplace, driver's license number, employer, position, and the like.The records may include patients' historical clinical information, suchas, medication histories and dosages, allergies, family medical history,past interventions received, major illnesses, congenital abnormalities,previous healthcare providers and their contact information, pastinsurance information, and the like. The records may include patients'current clinical information, such as, disease status, comorbidities,vital signs, relevant clinical test summaries, allergies, currentmedications and associated dosages, functional status, other healthcareproviders caring for a patient and the associated contact information,and the like.

In embodiments, the aggregation of patients' syndicated records mayinclude longitudinal information that may be plotted, displayed,analyzed, or the like and distributed to an RSS-enabled client in orderto permit longitudinal tracking of a patient or patient population. Forexample, aggregated, longitudinal data within a clinical indicator (e.g.blood pressure over time) for a single patient may be used to generatephysician alerts based upon statistically significant deviations fromnorms, a patient's historical average, etc. This aggregated data mayalso be used to provide physician's with intra-patient temporalcomparisons of clinical indicators (e.g. blood pressure on first visitwith blood pressure one year after first visit), or for healthcareadministrators to monitor healthcare provider performance (e.g. isPhysician A better managing patients' hypertension than Physician B).

In embodiments, the aggregation of patients' data through an RSS feed202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel may be associated with anapplication 406 consisting of a client-side program. The client-sideprogram may be formatted to operate on client devices such as, a desktopcomputer, laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to aggregate patients' records may be associated with an aggregator210 to track updates. In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSSstream, or RSS channel used aggregate patients' records may beassociated with a content management system that may provide summariesof the syndicated data available, dates associated with the syndicateddata, links to access the full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may aggregate syndicated patient datathrough the use of an application 406 providing social networking. Forexample, through social networking a physician may be able tocommunicate and share syndicated data with other healthcare providerswith whom the physician shares care for a patient, a clinical specialty,clinical population type, and the like. The clinical factors ofrelevance to physicians who seek to share clinical data may be publishedwith detailed tags to provide narrowly tailored or easily filtered RSSfeeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels for ongoing datasharing with colleagues. Such a process may allow physicians who carefor a common patient to aggregate all of that patient's data and moreefficiently share the patient's data and improve cross-specialtycollaboration in patient care. For example, a cardiologist may beunaware of very recent visits that one of her patients has made to otherhealthcare providers. With a syndicated data store associated with thispatient, a visit by the patient the prior day to his endocrinologist andany associated data entering his medical record could be made availableto the cardiologist for retrieval via RSS feed 202, web feed, RSSstream, or RSS channel without the delay associated with paper recordsor current relational-type database. Such a process may provide forphysicians to conduct virtual case studies with colleagues around theworld and learn clinical details, treatment strategies and the like in amore efficient and less costly manner than the traditional face-to-facephysician case study meetings. Also, aggregating the syndicated data ofpatients who share certain clinical indications may facilitateintra-clinical-group tracking and inter-clinical-group comparisons.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may aggregate syndicated patient datathrough the use of an application 406 providing a user interface 700 forviewing data, records, and the like. For example, a client 102 may, inresponse to user input such as clicking on a title of an item in theuser interface 700, retrieve the underlying item from the content source204 as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may aggregate syndicated patient datathrough the use of an application 406 associated with a media viewer.For example, an RSS item may refer to an image source, such as an MRIimage in a medical record from a hospital, and may specify a viewer forthe source image that is available through the registry. In operation, aclient (e.g. a physician) with appropriate permissions to view the image(also as managed, e.g., through the metadata for the enhancedsyndication system), may retrieve the appropriate viewer service fromthe registry, and apply the viewer to view the source image.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may aggregate syndicated patient datathrough the use of an application 406 providing vertical marketintegration. For example, as hospital-physicians update the medicationsand dosages of their patient population following clinical visits, thisdata may be aggregated by clinical specialty (e.g. cardiology patients)and this syndicated data may then be provided to the administrators therespective clinical areas via an RSS feed 202 and may permit theadministrators to more efficiency allocate resources, plan personnel,and the like.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may aggregate syndicated patient datathat is associated with database functions that may permit the dataquality to be verified, provide for transformation of the data, enablesearching, filtering, or clustering the patient data, or categorizingthe data into hierarchies, interrelationships, interrelated groups, andthe like.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may aggregate syndicated patient datathat is associated with semantic rules 412 that enable the creation ofmetadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadata enrichment ofaggregated data, interpretation or translation of aggregated data, aswell as permit the creation of knowledge structures (e.g., using OPML)and the use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may aggregate syndicated patient datato which others may subscribe and/or publish. For example, within apediatric physician group all physicians may be able to subscribe and/orpublish to an a 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel, “influenza”that regularly updates and retrieves information from across the entirepractice on rates of childhood influenza that are being seen and treatedby the physicians within the practice, and which is aggregated withother syndicated data on influenza rates from outside the physician'sspecific practice group.

In embodiments, the aggregated syndicated patient data may be furtherassociated with information that may provide for the management of thedata. For example, the aggregated data may list the author of theaggregated data, the date on which it was authored, etc. Thus, the datamay provide for further aggregation, republication, and the like.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may aggregate syndicated patient datawithin an infrastructure 416 that provides for data security,authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSS feeds 202,web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pinging technology,and/or other communications.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, may aggregate syndicated patient datathat is associated with special formatting and/or display properties.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, aggregate syndicated patient datathat is associated with special identification and transaction relatedproperties.

In embodiments, a physician and/or her support staff personnel, orsupporting healthcare institution, aggregate syndicated patient datathat is associated with restricted or conditional access properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, andthe like may interact with syndicated medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like in a syndicated format to enable interested persons toshare and continually update their medical knowledge via syndicated dataobtained through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel.The syndicated information may include full academic journal articles,article abstracts, customized article summaries, clinic trial data,clinical trial analyses, published standards of care, published clinicalindicators for medications, published indicators for interventions,appropriateness scores for certain classes of clinical profiles andcorresponding treatment options, and the like.

In embodiments, the interaction with syndicated medical research,clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academicpresentations, and the like through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSSstream, or RSS channel may be associated with an application 406consisting of a client-side program. The client-side program may beformatted to operate on client devices such as, a desktop computer,laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like may be associated with an aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like may be associated with a content management system that mayprovide summaries of the syndicated data available, dates associatedwith the syndicated data, links to access the full, non-summarized data,and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical research, clinical trial findings, casestudies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations, and the likethrough the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providing socialnetworking.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical research, clinical trial findings, casestudies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations, and the likethrough the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providing a userinterface 700 for viewing data, records, and the like. For example, aclient 102 may, in response to user input such as clicking on a title ofan item in the user interface 700, retrieve the underlying item from thecontent source 204 as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical research, clinical trial findings, casestudies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations, and the likethrough the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providing a mediaviewer. For example, an RSS item consisting of a multimedia academicconference presentation may refer to graphic images, such as PowerPointslides, and may specify a viewer for the source image that is availablethrough the registry. In operation, a client (e.g. a physician) withappropriate permissions to view the image (also as managed, e.g.,through the metadata for the enhanced syndication system), may retrievethe appropriate viewer service from the registry, and apply the viewerto view the source image.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical research, clinical trial findings, casestudies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations, and the likethrough the use of an application 406 providing vertical marketintegration. For example, if cardiologists within a hospital practiceare frequently viewing American College of Cardiology conferencepresentations via an RSS-enabled application 406, this information maybe used by the hospital CFO to justify budgeting for the hospital'scardiologists to attend the annual event.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical research, clinical trial findings, casestudies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations, and the likeassociated with database functions that may permit the data quality tobe verified, provide for transformation of the data, enable searching,filtering, or clustering the patient data, or categorizing the data intohierarchies, interrelationships, interrelated groups, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical research, clinical trial findings, casestudies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations, and the likethat is associated with semantic rules 412 that enable the creation ofmetadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadata enrichment,interpretation or translation of medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like, as well as permit the creation of knowledge structures(e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical research, clinical trial findings, casestudies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations, and the like towhich others may subscribe and/or publish. For example, within apediatric physician group all physicians may be able to subscribe and/orpublish to an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel, “NewEngland Journal of Medicine” that regularly updates and retrievesinformation from the academic medical journal relevant to pediatricmedicine and distributes the information to the physicians within thepractice.

In embodiments, the syndicated medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like may be further associated with information that may providefor the management of the data. For example, the data may list theauthor of the data, the date on which it was authored, etc. Thus, thedata may provide for further aggregation, republication, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, andthe like may interact with syndicated medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like within an infrastructure 416 that provides for datasecurity, authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSSfeeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pingingtechnology, and/or other communications.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical research, clinical trial findings, casestudies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations, and the likeassociated with special formatting and/or display properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical research, clinical trial findings, casestudies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations, and the likeassociated with special identification and/or transactional properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical research, clinical trial findings, casestudies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations, and the likeassociated with restricted or conditional access properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, andthe like may interact with medical decision making “trees” in asyndicated format to enable healthcare providers to better evaluatetreatment options via syndicated data obtained through an RSS feed 202,web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel. The syndicated information mayinclude empiric data summaries describing the probabilities of certainoutcomes that are associated with various treatment options, and thelike.

In embodiments, the saving, storing, merging, retrieval, and publicationof syndicated medical decision making trees through an RSS feed 202, webfeed, RSS stream, or RSS channel may be associated with an application406 consisting of a client-side program. The client-side program may beformatted to operate on client devices such as, a desktop computer,laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated medical decision making trees may beassociated with an aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated medical decision making trees may beassociated with a content management system that may provide summariesof the syndicated data available, dates associated with the syndicateddata, links to access the full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical decision making trees through the useof an RSS-enabled application 406 providing social networking.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical decision making trees through the useof an RSS-enabled application 406 providing a user interface 700 forviewing data, records, and the like. For example, a client 102 may, inresponse to user input such as clicking on a title of an item in theuser interface 700, retrieve the underlying item from the content source204 as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical decision making trees through the useof an RSS-enabled application 406 providing a media viewer or forvertical market integration.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical decision making trees associated withdatabase functions that may permit the data quality to be verified,provide for transformation of the data, enable searching, filtering, orclustering the patient data, or categorizing the data into hierarchies,interrelationships, interrelated groups, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical decision making trees associated withsemantic rules 412 that enable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules412 may also provide for metadata enrichment, interpretation ortranslation of medical decision making trees, as well as permit thecreation of knowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of adictionary, thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical decision making trees to which othersmay subscribe and/or publish. For example, within a cardiology physiciangroup all physicians may be able to subscribe and/or publish to an RSSfeed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel, “Angioplasty” thatregularly updates and retrieves medical decision making trees thatsummarize the clinical outcome probabilities for patients eitherundergoing, or not undergoing angioplasty for a variety of clinicalgroups, classes, and indicators, and distributes the information to thephysicians within the practice.

In embodiments, the syndicated medical decision making trees may befurther associated with information that may provide for the managementof the data. For example, the data may list the source of the decisionmaking tree, the date on which it was last updated, etc. Thus, the datamay provide for further aggregation, republication, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, andthe like may interact with syndicated medical decision making treeswithin an infrastructure 416 that provides for data security,authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSS feeds 202,web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pinging technology,and/or other communications.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical decision making trees associated withspecial formatting and/or display properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical decision making trees associated withspecial identification and transactional properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated medical decision making trees associated withrestricted or conditional access properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, andthe like may interact with clinical standards of care for clinicalindicators in a syndicated format to enable healthcare providers toverify the appropriate standard at the point of decision making viasyndicated data obtained through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream,or RSS channel. The syndicated information may include information onrecommended medication dosages, use of interventions, surgeries, andother information relating to the care of patients.

In embodiments, the saving, storing, merging, retrieval, and publicationof syndicated clinical standards of care for clinical indicators throughan RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel may be associatedwith an application 406 consisting of a client-side program. Theclient-side program may be formatted to operate on client devices suchas, a desktop computer, laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, acellular phone, Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMStext-enabled device, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated clinical standards of care for clinicalindicators may be associated with an aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated clinical standards of care for clinicalindicators may be associated with a content management system that mayprovide summaries of the syndicated data available, dates associatedwith the syndicated data, links to access the full, non-summarized data,and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with clinical standards of care for clinical indicators throughthe use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providing for socialnetworking and vertical market integration.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated clinical standards of care for clinicalindicators through the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providing auser interface 700 for viewing data, records, and the like. For example,a client 102 may, in response to user input such as clicking on a titleof an item in the user interface 700, retrieve the underlying item fromthe content source 204 as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated clinical standards of care for clinicalindicators through the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providing amedia viewer.

*[0042—W10-15] In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcareproviders, institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditationgroups, may interact with syndicated clinical standards of care forclinical indicators associated with database functions that may permitthe data quality to be verified, provide for transformation of the data,enable searching, filtering, or clustering the patient data, orcategorizing the data into hierarchies, interrelationships, interrelatedgroups, and the like.

*[0042—W17-21] In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcareproviders, institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditationgroups, may interact with syndicated clinical standards of care forclinical indicators associated with semantic rules 412 that enable thecreation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadataenrichment, interpretation or translation of medical decision makingtrees, as well as permit the creation of knowledge structures (e.g.,using OPML) and the use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated clinical standards of care for clinicalindicators to which others may subscribe and/or publish. For example,within a cardiology physician group all physicians may be able tosubscribe and/or publish to an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, orRSS channel, “Standard of Care: Hypertension” that regularly updates andretrieves clinical standards of care for clinical indicators thatsummarize the standards of care for the treatment of hypertension anddistributes the information to the physicians within the practice.

In embodiments, the syndicated clinical standards of care for clinicalindicators may be further associated with information that may providefor the management of the data. For example, the data may list thesource of the clinical standard of care, the date on which it was lastupdated, etc. Thus, the data may provide for further aggregation,republication, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, andthe like may interact with syndicated clinical standards of care forclinical indicators within an infrastructure 416 that provides for datasecurity, authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSSfeed 202 s, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pingingtechnology, and/or other communications.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated clinical standards of care for clinicalindicators associated with special formatting and/or display properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated clinical standards of care for clinicalindicators associated with special identification and transactionalproperties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated clinical standards of care for clinicalindicators associated with restricted or conditional access properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, andthe like may interact with analyses of the congruence between apatient's treatment and clinical standards of care for clinicalindicators matching that patient in a syndicated format to enableverification of appropriate treatment decisions via syndicated dataobtained through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel.The syndicated information may be associated with an analytic backendthat can perform analyses on syndicated data stream and summarize theresults in a syndicated format for distribution/retrieval. For example,an RSS-enabled client may present frequency distributions, contingencytables, descriptive statistics, predictive statistics, and the like ofsalient features of a physician's practice, trends, in comparison withstandards of care. This analysis may be applied to qualitative orquantitative data.

In embodiments, the saving, storing, merging, retrieval, and publicationof syndicated analyses of the congruence between a patient's treatmentand clinical standards of care through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSSstream, or RSS channel may be associated with an application 406consisting of a client-side program. The client-side program may beformatted to operate on client devices such as, a desktop computer,laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated analyses of the congruence between apatient's treatment and clinical standards of care may be associatedwith an aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated analyses of the congruence between apatient's treatment and clinical standards of care may be associatedwith a content management system that may provide summaries of thesyndicated data available, dates associated with the syndicated data,links to access the full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with analyses of the congruence between a patient's treatmentand clinical standards of care through the use of an RSS-enabledapplication 406 providing for social networking and vertical marketintegration.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated analyses of the congruence between a patient'streatment and clinical standards of care through the use of anRSS-enabled application 406 providing a user interface 700 for viewingdata, records, and the like. For example, a client 102 may, in responseto user input such as clicking on a title of an item in the userinterface 700, retrieve the underlying item from the content source 204as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated analyses of the congruence between a patient'streatment and clinical standards of care through the use of anRSS-enabled application 406 providing a media viewer.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated analyses of the congruence between a patient'streatment and clinical standards of care associated with databasefunctions that may permit the data quality to be verified, provide fortransformation of the data, enable searching, filtering, or clusteringthe patient data, or categorizing the data into hierarchies,interrelationships, interrelated groups, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated analyses of the congruence between a patient'streatment and clinical standards of care associated with semantic rules412 that enable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may alsoprovide for metadata enrichment, interpretation or translation ofmedical decision making trees, as well as permit the creation ofknowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary,thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated analyses of the congruence between a patient'streatment and clinical standards of care to which others may subscribeand/or publish.

In embodiments, the syndicated analyses of the congruence between apatient's treatment and clinical standards of care may be furtherassociated with information that may provide for the management of thedata. For example, the data may list the source of the clinical standardof care, the date on which it was last updated, etc. Thus, the data mayprovide for further aggregation, republication, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, andthe like may interact with syndicated analyses of the congruence betweena patient's treatment and clinical standards of care within aninfrastructure 416 that provides for data security, authentication,management of the traffic created by the RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSSstreams, or RSS channels, logging and pinging technology, and/or othercommunications.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated analyses of the congruence between a patient'streatment and clinical standards of care associated with specialformatting and/or display properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated analyses of the congruence between a patient'streatment and clinical standards of care associated with specialidentification and transactional properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated analyses of the congruence between a patient'streatment and clinical standards of care associated with restricted orconditional access properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, andthe like may interact with summaries of intervention complication rates,medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survival ratesassociated with interventions and medications, surgical success rates,remission rates, and the like for retrieval through an RSS feed 202, webfeed, RSS stream, or RSS channel.

In embodiments, interaction with syndicated summaries of interventioncomplication rates, medication side effects (e.g. incidence andprevalence), survival rates associated with interventions andmedications, surgical success rates, remission rates, and the likethrough an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel may beassociated with an application 406 consisting of a client-side program.The client-side program may be formatted to operate on client devicessuch as, a desktop computer, laptop computer, “pocket” personalcomputer, a cellular phone, Blackberry, personal digital assistant, orother SMS text-enabled device, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated summaries of intervention complicationrates, medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survivalrates associated with interventions and medications, surgical successrates, remission rates, and the like may be associated with anaggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated summaries of intervention complicationrates, medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survivalrates associated with interventions and medications, surgical successrates, remission rates, and the like may be associated with a contentmanagement system that may provide summaries of the syndicated dataavailable, dates associated with the syndicated data, links to accessthe full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with summaries of intervention complication rates, medicationside effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survival rates associatedwith interventions and medications, surgical success rates, remissionrates, and the like through the use of an RSS-enabled application 406providing for social networking and vertical market integration.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated summaries of intervention complication rates,medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survival ratesassociated with interventions and medications, surgical success rates,remission rates, and the like through the use of an RSS-enabledapplication 406 providing a user interface 700 for viewing data,records, and the like. For example, a client 102 may, in response touser input such as clicking on a title of an item in the user interface700, retrieve the underlying item from the content source 204 asindicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated summaries of intervention complication rates,medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survival ratesassociated with interventions and medications, surgical success rates,remission rates, and the like through the use of an RSS-enabledapplication 406 providing a media viewer.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated summaries of intervention complication rates,medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survival ratesassociated with interventions and medications, surgical success rates,remission rates, and the like associated with database functions thatmay permit the data quality to be verified, provide for transformationof the data, enable searching, filtering, or clustering the patientdata, or categorizing the data into hierarchies, interrelationships,interrelated groups, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated summaries of intervention complication rates,medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survival ratesassociated with interventions and medications, surgical success rates,remission rates, and the like associated with semantic rules 412 thatenable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide formetadata enrichment, interpretation or translation of medical decisionmaking trees, as well as permit the creation of knowledge structures(e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated summaries of intervention complication rates,medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survival ratesassociated with interventions and medications, surgical success rates,remission rates, and the like indicators to which others may subscribeand/or publish. For example, within a cardiology physician group allphysicians may be able to subscribe and/or publish to an RSS feed 202,web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel, “Side Effects: Zocor” thatregularly updates and retrieves data on side effects associated with themedication Zocor, perhaps stratified by certain patient characteristics(e.g. age) and distributes the information to the physicians within thepractice.

In embodiments, the syndicated summaries of intervention complicationrates, medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survivalrates associated with interventions and medications, surgical successrates, remission rates, and the like may be further associated withinformation that may provide for the management of the data. Forexample, the data may list the source of the records, the date on whichit was last updated, etc. Thus, the data may provide for furtheraggregation, republication, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, andthe like may interact with syndicated summaries of interventioncomplication rates, medication side effects (e.g. incidence andprevalence), survival rates associated with interventions andmedications, surgical success rates, remission rates, and the likewithin an infrastructure 416 that provides for data security,authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSS feeds 202,web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pinging technology,and/or other communications.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated summaries of intervention complication rates,medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survival ratesassociated with interventions and medications, surgical success rates,remission rates, and the like associated with special formatting and/ordisplay properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated summaries of intervention complication rates,medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survival ratesassociated with interventions and medications, surgical success rates,remission rates, and the like associated with special identificationproperties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated summaries of intervention complication rates,medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survival ratesassociated with interventions and medications, surgical success rates,remission rates, and the like associated with restricted or conditionalaccess properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, andthe like may interact with data regarding the occurrence and details ofadverse events within a patient population for retrieval through an RSSfeed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel.

In embodiments, the saving, storing, merging, retrieval, and publicationof syndicated data regarding the occurrence and details of adverseevents within a patient population through an RSS feed 202, web feed,RSS stream, or RSS channel may be associated with an application 406consisting of a client-side program. The client-side program may beformatted to operate on client devices such as, a desktop computer,laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated data regarding the occurrence anddetails of adverse events within a patient population may be associatedwith an aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated data regarding the occurrence anddetails of adverse events within a patient population may be associatedwith a content management system that may provide summaries of thesyndicated data available, dates associated with the syndicated data,links to access the full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated data regarding the occurrence and details ofadverse events within a patient population through the use of anRSS-enabled application 406 providing for social networking and verticalmarket integration.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated data regarding the occurrence and details ofadverse events within a patient population through the use of anRSS-enabled application 406 providing a user interface 700 for viewingdata, records, and the like. For example, a client 102 may, in responseto user input such as clicking on a title of an item in the userinterface 700, retrieve the underlying item from the content source 204as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated data regarding the occurrence and details ofadverse events within a patient population through the use of anRSS-enabled application 406 providing a media viewer.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated data regarding the occurrence and details ofadverse events within a patient population associated with databasefunctions that may permit the data quality to be verified, provide fortransformation of the data, enable searching, filtering, or clusteringthe patient data, or categorizing the data into hierarchies,interrelationships, interrelated groups, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated data regarding the occurrence and details ofadverse events within a patient population associated with semanticrules 412 that enable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 mayalso provide for metadata enrichment, interpretation or translation ofmedical decision making trees, as well as permit the creation ofknowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary,thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated data regarding the occurrence and details ofadverse events within a patient population indicators to which othersmay subscribe and/or publish. For example, within a cardiology physiciangroup physicians may be able to subscribe and/or publish to an RSS feed202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel, “Sudden Cardiac Death” thatregularly updates and retrieves data on patients experiencing suddencardiac death within their group practice, hospital, etc, perhapsstratified by certain patient characteristics (e.g. age) and distributesthe information to the physicians within the practice.

In embodiments, the syndicated data regarding the occurrence and detailsof adverse events within a patient population may be further associatedwith information that may provide for the management of the data. Forexample, the data may list the source of the records, the date on whichit was last updated, etc. Thus, the data may provide for furtheraggregation, republication, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, andthe like may interact with syndicated data regarding the occurrence anddetails of adverse events within a patient population within aninfrastructure 416 that provides for data security, authentication,management of the traffic created by the RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSSstreams, or RSS channels, logging and pinging technology, and/or othercommunications.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated data regarding the occurrence and details ofadverse events within a patient population associated with specialformatting and/or display properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated data regarding the occurrence and details ofadverse events within a patient population associated with specialidentification and transactional properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated data regarding the occurrence and details ofadverse events within a patient population associated with restricted orconditional access properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, and the like may interact with data patient recordsmatched according to user-assigned criteria of clinical relevance to apending medical decision regarding a current patient's treatment forretrieval through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel.For example, a physician may be consulting with Patient A about thecourse of her cardiology treatment and which of the available medicationoptions available might be best for her. As part of this decision makingprocess the physician may retrieve the syndicated data of a Patient B,or group of patients, matching relevant clinical criteria of Patient A(e.g. age, sex, race, disease status, comorbidities, etc.). This datamay serve to inform the patient, using experiential patient data, of,for example, the side effects that other patients have experienced withthe various drugs available to her for treatment. Data derived fromgroups of patients may also serve to provide Patient A with theprobabilities associated with certain events arising from taking each ofthe medications available to her. In this manner, the physician andpatient may be better informed and able to way the pros and cons of eachchoice in a personalized fashion.

In embodiments, the saving, storing, merging, retrieval, and publicationof syndicated patient records matched according to user-assignedcriteria of clinical relevance to a pending medical decision regarding acurrent patient's treatment through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSSstream, or RSS channel may be associated with an application 406consisting of a client-side program. The client-side program may beformatted to operate on client devices such as, a desktop computer,laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated patient records matched according touser-assigned criteria of clinical relevance to a pending medicaldecision regarding a current patient's treatment may be associated withan aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated patient records matched according touser-assigned criteria of clinical relevance to a pending medicaldecision regarding a current patient's treatment may be associated witha content management system that may provide summaries of the syndicateddata available, dates associated with the syndicated data, links toaccess the full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated patient records matched according touser-assigned criteria of clinical relevance to a pending medicaldecision regarding a current patient's treatment through the use of anRSS-enabled application 406 providing for social networking and verticalmarket integration.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, and the like, may interact with syndicated patient recordsmatched according to user-assigned criteria of clinical relevance to apending medical decision regarding a current patient's treatment throughthe use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providing a user interface 700for viewing data, records, and the like. For example, a client 102 may,in response to user input such as clicking on a title of an item in theuser interface 700, retrieve the underlying item from the content source204 as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, and the like, may interact with patient records matchedaccording to user-assigned criteria of clinical relevance to a pendingmedical decision regarding a current patient's treatment through the useof an RSS-enabled application 406 providing a media viewer.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, and the like, may interact with syndicated patient recordsmatched according to user-assigned criteria of clinical relevance to apending medical decision regarding a current patient's treatmentassociated with database functions that may permit the data quality tobe verified, provide for transformation of the data, enable searching,filtering, or clustering the patient data, or categorizing the data intohierarchies, interrelationships, interrelated groups, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, and the like, may interact with syndicated patient recordsmatched according to user-assigned criteria of clinical relevance to apending medical decision regarding a current patient's treatmentassociated with semantic rules 412 that enable the creation of metadata.Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadata enrichment,interpretation or translation of medical decision making trees, as wellas permit the creation of knowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) andthe use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, and the like, may interact with syndicated patient recordsmatched according to user-assigned criteria of clinical relevance to apending medical decision regarding a current patient's treatment towhich others may subscribe and/or publish.

In embodiments, the syndicated patient records matched according touser-assigned criteria of clinical relevance to a pending medicaldecision regarding a current patient's treatment may be furtherassociated with information that may provide for the management of thedata. For example, the data may list the source of the records, the dateon which it was last updated, etc. Thus, the data may provide forfurther aggregation, republication, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, and the like, and the like may interact with syndicatedpatient records matched according to user-assigned criteria of clinicalrelevance to a pending medical decision regarding a current patient'streatment within an infrastructure 416 that provides for data security,authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSS feeds 202,web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pinging technology,and/or other communications.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, and the like, may interact with syndicated patient recordsmatched according to user-assigned criteria of clinical relevance to apending medical decision regarding a current patient's treatmentassociated with special formatting and/or display properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, and the like, may interact with syndicated patient recordsmatched according to user-assigned criteria of clinical relevance to apending medical decision regarding a current patient's treatmentassociated with special identification and transactional properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, and the like, may interact with syndicated patient recordsmatched according to user-assigned criteria of clinical relevance to apending medical decision regarding a current patient's treatmentassociated with restricted or conditional access properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, andthe like may interact with syndicated comparisons of patients' outcomeswith national norms for retrieval through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSSstream, or RSS channel.

In embodiments, interaction with syndicated comparisons of patients'outcomes with national norms through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSSstream, or RSS channel may be associated with an application 406consisting of a client-side program. The client-side program may beformatted to operate on client devices such as, a desktop computer,laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated comparisons of patients' outcomes withnational norms within a patient population may be associated with anaggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated comparisons of patients' outcomes withnational norms within a patient population may be associated with acontent management system that may provide summaries of the syndicateddata available, dates associated with the syndicated data, links toaccess the full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated comparisons of patients' outcomes with nationalnorms within a patient population through the use of an RSS-enabledapplication 406 providing for social networking and vertical marketintegration.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated comparisons of patients' outcomes with nationalnorms through the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providing a userinterface 700 for viewing data, records, and the like. For example, aclient 102 may, in response to user input such as clicking on a title ofan item in the user interface 700, retrieve the underlying item from thecontent source 204 as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated comparisons of patients' outcomes with nationalnorms within a patient population through the use of an RSS-enabledapplication 406 providing a media viewer.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated comparisons of patients' outcomes with nationalnorms within a patient population associated with database functionsthat may permit the data quality to be verified, provide fortransformation of the data, enable searching, filtering, or clusteringthe patient data, or categorizing the data into hierarchies,interrelationships, interrelated groups, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated comparisons of patients' outcomes with nationalnorms within a patient population associated with semantic rules 412that enable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may alsoprovide for metadata enrichment, interpretation or translation ofmedical decision making trees, as well as permit the creation ofknowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary,thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated comparisons of patients' outcomes with nationalnorms to which others may subscribe and/or publish. For example, withina cardiology physician group physicians may wish to compare how theirpatients fare following a certain intervention type as compared to otherpatients within a practice group, with local norms, national norms, etc.Similarly, an institution, regulatory body or accreditation group mayseek to compare the outcomes of different institutions, providers, andthe like.

In embodiments, the syndicated comparisons of patients' outcomes withnational norms may be further associated with information that mayprovide for the management of the data. For example, the data may listthe source of the national norms, the date on which it was last updated,etc. Thus, the data may provide for further aggregation, republication,and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, andthe like may interact with syndicated comparisons of patients' outcomeswith national norms within a patient population within an infrastructure416 that provides for data security, authentication, management of thetraffic created by the RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSSchannels, logging and pinging technology, and/or other communications.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated comparisons of patients' outcomes with nationalnorms within a patient population associated with special formattingand/or display properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated comparisons of patients' outcomes with nationalnorms within a patient population associated with special identificationand transactional properties.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated comparisons of patients' outcomes with nationalnorms within a patient population associated with restricted orconditional access properties.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be configured by a patient, attending physician, nurse,other healthcare provider, hospital, physician practice, insurer,patient advocacy group, or third-party enterprise, or the like. Thisconfiguration may be based at least in part on a patient's demographicprofile (e.g. age, sex, race), clinical indications (e.g. cardiovasculardisease, lung cancer), the institution(s) visited by the patient toreceive healthcare (e.g. solo practitioner, physician group, hospital,academic center), the ICD-10 codes of the patient's current clinicalindications (e.g. “1.8.6 (H40-H42)”=Glaucoma), the ICD-10 codes of thepatient's past clinical indications, the geographic locations of thepatient's current and former addresses, current list of medications thepatient is taking (e.g. Beta-blocker, Prozac, Zocor), the patient'smedication history, the interventions the patient has received (e.g.angioplasty, colonoscopy), allergies, insurers, and so forth.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with an application 406 consisting of aclient-side program. The client-side program may be formatted to operateon client devices such as, a desktop computer, laptop computer, “pocket”personal computer, a cellular phone, Blackberry, or personal digitalassistant, other SMS text-enabled device, or the like.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with an aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with a content management system that mayprovide summaries of the syndicated data available, dates associatedwith the syndicated data, links to access the full, non-summarized data,and the like.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with an application 406 providing socialnetworking. For example, through social networking a patient may be ableto share syndicated data with other patients, physician's and the like,with whom the patient shares a clinical issue, disease, medicationprescription, clinical course of care, intervention history, pendingintervention, and the like. The clinical factors of relevance topatients who seek to share syndicated data may be published withdetailed tags to provide narrowly tailored or easily filtered RSS feeds202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels for ongoing data sharingwith others. Such a process may allow patients to form support groups,information-sharing collaborations, to link with others who haveundergone treatments that a patient is contemplating undergoing herself,and the like.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with an application 406 providing a userinterface 700 for viewing data, records, and the like. For example, aclient 102 may, in response to user input such as clicking on a title ofan item in the user interface 700, retrieve the underlying item from thecontent source 204 as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with an application 406 providing a mediaviewer. For example, an RSS item may refer to an image source, such asan MRI image in a medical record from a hospital, and may specify aviewer for the source image that is available through the registry. Inoperation, a client (e.g. a physician) with appropriate permissions toview the image (also as managed, e.g., through the metadata for theenhanced syndication system), may retrieve the appropriate viewerservice from the registry, and apply the viewer to view the sourceimage.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with an application 406 providing verticalmarket integration. For example, a retail pharmacy may obtain syndicateddata on a patient's medications and dosages through an RSS feed 202, webfeed, RSS stream, or RSS channel, permitting the pharmacy to receiveupdates and changes to a customer's pharmaceutical needs.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with database functions that may permit thedata quality to be verified, provide for transformation of the patients'data, enable searching, filtering, or clustering the patient data, orcategorizing the data into hierarchies, interrelationships, interrelatedgroups, and the like.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with semantic rules 412 that enable thecreation of intra-, or inter-patient, -clinical state, -institution,etc. metadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadataenrichment, interpretation or translation of patient data, as well aspermit the creation of knowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and theuse of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may interact with syndicated data to which others may subscribeand/or publish. For example, a patient undergoing chemotherapy mayreceive syndicated data from her healthcare providers regarding theprogress of ridding his lungs of cancer. The patient may, in turn,record this information and his thoughts, feelings, symptoms, and thelike in a weekly written log that is stored as syndicated data, andcreate a feed called “My Experiences with Chemotherapy.” Others who havean interest in learning about a very personal summary of the effects ofchemotherapy, perhaps because they are about to undergo similartreatment, have a loved one who is, may subscribe and/or publish to thisfeed.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with information that may provide for themanagement of the data. For example, the data may list the author of thedata, the date on which it was authored, etc. Thus, the data may providefor further aggregation, republication, and the like.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with an infrastructure 416 that provides fordata security, authentication, management of the traffic created by theRSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging andpinging technology, and/or other communications.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with special formatting and/or displayproperties.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with special identification and transactionalproperties.

In embodiments, a patient's RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSSchannel may be associated with restricted or conditional accessproperties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated comparisons ofphysicians' performance, treatment outcomes, event rates, and the likewith national norms for retrieval through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSSstream, or RSS channel.

In embodiments, interaction with syndicated comparisons of physicians'performance, treatment outcomes, event rates, and the like with nationalnorms through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel maybe associated with an application 406 consisting of a client-sideprogram. The client-side program may be formatted to operate on clientdevices such as, a desktop computer, laptop computer, “pocket” personalcomputer, a cellular phone, Blackberry, personal digital assistant, orother SMS text-enabled device, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated comparisons of physicians' performance,treatment outcomes, event rates, and the like with national norms may beassociated with an aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated comparisons of physicians' performance,treatment outcomes, event rates, and the like with national norms may beassociated with a content management system that may provide summariesof the syndicated data available, dates associated with the syndicateddata, links to access the full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated comparisons of physicians' performance,treatment outcomes, event rates, and the like with national normsthrough the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providing for socialnetworking and vertical market integration.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated comparisons ofphysicians' performance, treatment outcomes, event rates, and the likewith national norms through the use of an RSS-enabled application 406providing a user interface 700 for viewing data, records, and the like.In another embodiment, a patient may configure a comparison usingsyndicated data or data pools containing raw data for events, treatmentoutcomes, and the like. For example, a client 102 may, in response touser input such as clicking on a title of an item in the user interface700, retrieve the underlying item from the content source 204 asindicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated comparisons ofphysicians' performance, treatment outcomes, event rates, and the likewith national norms through the use of an RSS-enabled application 406providing a media viewer.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated comparisons ofphysicians' performance, treatment outcomes, event rates, and the likewith national norms associated with database functions that may permitthe data quality to be verified, provide for transformation of the data,enable searching, filtering, or clustering the patient data, orcategorizing the data into hierarchies, interrelationships, interrelatedgroups, and the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated comparisons ofphysicians' performance, treatment outcomes, event rates, and the likewith national norms associated with semantic rules 412 that enable thecreation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadataenrichment, interpretation or translation of medical decision makingtrees, as well as permit the creation of knowledge structures (e.g.,using OPML) and the use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated comparisons ofphysicians' performance, treatment outcomes, event rates, and the likewith national norms to which others may subscribe and/or publish. Forexample, a state regulatory agency may publish syndicated data on theevent rates following coronary artery bypass grafting for all healthcareinstitutions within the state performing the intervention. Thissyndicated data may, in turn, comprise an RSS feed 202, “CABG EventRates by Institution in State X,” to which other interested parties maysubscribe.

In embodiments, the syndicated comparisons of physicians' performance,treatment outcomes, event rates, and the like with national norms may befurther associated with information that may provide for the managementof the data. For example, the data may list the date on which it waslast updated, etc. Thus, the data may provide for further aggregation,republication, and the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated comparisons ofphysicians' performance, treatment outcomes, event rates, and the likewith national norms within an infrastructure 416 that provides for datasecurity, authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSSfeeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pingingtechnology, and/or other communications.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated comparisons ofphysicians' performance, treatment outcomes, event rates, and the likewith national norms associated with special formatting and/or displayproperties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated comparisons ofphysicians' performance, treatment outcomes, event rates, and the likewith national norms associated with special identification andtransactional properties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated comparisons ofphysicians' performance, treatment outcomes, event rates, and the likewith national norms associated with restricted or conditional accessproperties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with, and share with healthcareproviders, syndicated summaries of their current health status,functional status, quality of life, clinical values, and the like forretrieval through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel.For example, a patient returning home following knee-replacement surgerymay complete self-report health status questionnaires regarding itemssuch as his overall health status (e.g., as measure by a standardizedquestionnaire like the SF-36), the range of motion in his operative leg,his pain level, overall functional status and mobility, and the like.This information may be retrieved by his surgeon, primary carephysician, physical therapist, insurer and so on in order to continuallymonitor his recovery and more easily note significant aberrations fromthe expected course of recovery that may necessitate an immediateconsultation. Similarly, a diabetic patient may record his daily glucoselevels in a syndicated format for retrieval by healthcare personnel.

In embodiments, interaction with syndicated summaries of patients'current health status, functional status, quality of life, clinicalvalues, and the like through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, orRSS channel may be associated with an application 406 consisting of aclient-side program. The client-side program may be formatted to operateon client devices such as, a desktop computer, laptop computer, “pocket”personal computer, a cellular phone, Blackberry, personal digitalassistant, or other SMS text-enabled device, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated summaries of patients' current healthstatus, functional status, quality of life, clinical values, and thelike may be associated with an aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated summaries of patients' current healthstatus, functional status, quality of life, clinical values, and thelike may be associated with a content management system that may providesummaries of the syndicated data available, dates associated with thesyndicated data, links to access the full, non-summarized data, and thelike.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated summaries of patients' current health status,functional status, quality of life, clinical values, and the likethrough the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providing for socialnetworking and vertical market integration.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofpatients' current health status, functional status, quality of life,clinical values, and the like through the use of an RSS-enabledapplication 406 providing a user interface 700 for viewing data,records, and the like. For example, a client 102 may, in response touser input such as clicking on a title of an item in the user interface700, retrieve the underlying item from the content source 204 asindicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofpatients' current health status, functional status, quality of life,clinical values, and the like with national norms through the use of anRSS-enabled application 406 providing a media viewer.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofpatients' current health status, functional status, quality of life,clinical values, and the like associated with database functions thatmay permit the data quality to be verified, provide for transformationof the data, enable searching, filtering, or clustering the patientdata, or categorizing the data into hierarchies, interrelationships,interrelated groups, and the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofpatients' current health status, functional status, quality of life,clinical values, and the like associated with semantic rules 412 thatenable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide formetadata enrichment, interpretation or translation of medical decisionmaking trees, as well as permit the creation of knowledge structures(e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofpatients' current health status, functional status, quality of life,clinical values, and the like to which others may subscribe and/orpublish.

In embodiments, the syndicated summaries of patients' current healthstatus, functional status, quality of life, clinical values, and thelike may be further associated with information that may provide for themanagement of the data. For example, the data may list the date on whichit was last updated, etc. Thus, the data may provide for furtheraggregation, republication, and the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofpatients' current health status, functional status, quality of life,clinical values, and the like within an infrastructure 416 that providesfor data security, authentication, management of the traffic created bythe RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging andpinging technology, and/or other communications.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofpatients' current health status, functional status, quality of life,clinical values, and the like associated with special formatting and/ordisplay properties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofpatients' current health status, functional status, quality of life,clinical values, clinical values, and the like associated with specialidentification and/or transactional properties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofpatients' current health status, functional status, quality of life,clinical values, and the like associated with restricted or conditionalaccess properties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical research,clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academicpresentations, and the like in a syndicated format to enable interestedpersons to share and continually update their medical knowledge viasyndicated data obtained through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream,or RSS channel. The syndicated information may include full academicjournal articles, article abstracts, customized article summaries,clinic trial data, clinical trial analyses, published standards of care,published clinical indicators for medications, published indicators forinterventions, appropriateness scores for certain classes of clinicalprofiles and corresponding treatment options, and the like.

In embodiments, the interaction with syndicated medical research,clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academicpresentations, and the like through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSSstream, or RSS channel may be associated with an application 406consisting of a client-side program. The client-side program may beformatted to operate on client devices such as, a desktop computer,laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like may be associated with an aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like may be associated with a content management system that mayprovide summaries of the syndicated data available, dates associatedwith the syndicated data, links to access the full, non-summarized data,and the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical research,clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academicpresentations, and the like through the use of an RSS-enabledapplication 406 providing social networking and/or vertical marketintegration.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical research,clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academicpresentations, and the like through the use of an RSS-enabledapplication 406 providing a user interface 700 for viewing data,records, and the like. For example, a client 102 may, in response touser input such as clicking on a title of an item in the user interface700, retrieve the underlying item from the content source 204 asindicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical research,clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academicpresentations, and the like through the use of an RSS-enabledapplication 406 providing a media viewer. For example, an RSS itemconsisting of a multimedia academic conference presentation may refer tographic images, such as PowerPoint slides, and may specify a viewer forthe source image that is available through the registry. In operation, aclient (e.g. a physician) with appropriate permissions to view the image(also as managed, e.g., through the metadata for the enhancedsyndication system), may retrieve the appropriate viewer service fromthe registry, and apply the viewer to view the source image.

In embodiments patients may interact with syndicated medical research,clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academicpresentations, and the like associated with database functions that maypermit the data quality to be verified, provide for transformation ofthe data, enable searching, filtering, or clustering the patient data,or categorizing the data into hierarchies, interrelationships,interrelated groups, and the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical research,clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academicpresentations, and the like that is associated with semantic rules 412that enable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 may alsoprovide for metadata enrichment, interpretation or translation ofmedical research, clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewedarticles, academic presentations, and the like, as well as permit thecreation of knowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of adictionary, thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical research,clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academicpresentations, and the like to which others may subscribe and/orpublish. For example, a cardiology patient, her family, or otherinterested persons may be able to subscribe and/or publish to an RSSfeed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel, “Developments inCardiology” that regularly updates and retrieves information from theacademic medical journal relevant to cardiology and distributes theinformation to patients and other interested persons.

In embodiments, the syndicated medical research, clinical trialfindings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academic presentations,and the like may be further associated with information that may providefor the management of the data. For example, the data may list theauthor of the data, the date on which it was authored, etc. Thus, thedata may provide for further aggregation, republication, and the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical research,clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academicpresentations, and the like within an infrastructure 416 that providesfor data security, authentication, management of the traffic created bythe RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging andpinging technology, and/or other communications.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical research,clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academicpresentations, and the like associated with special formatting and/ordisplay properties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical research,clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academicpresentations, and the like associated with special identificationand/or transactional properties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical research,clinical trial findings, case studies, peer-reviewed articles, academicpresentations, and the like associated with restricted or conditionalaccess properties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with medical decision making treesin a syndicated format to enable healthcare providers to better evaluatetreatment options via syndicated data obtained through an RSS feed 202,web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel. The syndicated information mayinclude empiric data summaries describing the probabilities of certainoutcomes that are associated with various treatment options, and thelike.

In embodiments, the saving, storing, merging, retrieval, and publicationof syndicated medical decision making trees through an RSS feed 202, webfeed, RSS stream, or RSS channel may be associated with an application406 consisting of a client-side program. The client-side program may beformatted to operate on client devices such as, a desktop computer,laptop computer, “pocket” personal computer, a cellular phone,Blackberry, personal digital assistant, or other SMS text-enableddevice, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated medical decision making trees may beassociated with an aggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated medical decision making trees may beassociated with a content management system that may provide summariesof the syndicated data available, dates associated with the syndicateddata, links to access the full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical decisionmaking trees through the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providingsocial networking and/or vertical market integration.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical decisionmaking trees through the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providinga user interface 700 for viewing data, records, and the like. Forexample, a client 102 may, in response to user input such as clicking ona title of an item in the user interface 700, retrieve the underlyingitem from the content source 204 as indicated by an arrow 208.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical decisionmaking trees through the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providinga media viewer.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical decisionmaking trees associated with special formatting and/or displayproperties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical decisionmaking trees associated with special identification and/or transactionalproperties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical decisionmaking trees associated with restricted or conditional accessproperties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical decisionmaking trees associated with database functions that may permit the dataquality to be verified, provide for transformation of the data, enablesearching, filtering, or clustering the patient data, or categorizingthe data into hierarchies, interrelationships, interrelated groups, andthe like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical decisionmaking trees associated with semantic rules 412 that enable the creationof metadata. Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadataenrichment, interpretation or translation of medical decision makingtrees, as well as permit the creation of knowledge structures (e.g.,using OPML) and the use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical decisionmaking trees to which others may subscribe and/or publish. For example,a cardiology patient may be able to subscribe and/or publish to an RSSfeed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel, “Angioplasty” thatregularly updates and retrieves medical decision making trees thatsummarize the clinical outcome probabilities for patients eitherundergoing, or not undergoing angioplasty for a variety of clinicalgroups, classes, and indicators, and distributes the information to thepatient.

In embodiments, the syndicated medical decision making trees may befurther associated with information that may provide for the managementof the data. For example, the data may list the source of the decisionmaking tree, the date on which it was last updated, etc. Thus, the datamay provide for further aggregation, republication, and the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated medical decisionmaking trees within an infrastructure 416 that provides for datasecurity, authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSSfeeds 202, web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pingingtechnology, and/or other communications.

In embodiments, patients may interact with summaries of interventioncomplication rates, medication side effects (e.g. incidence andprevalence), survival rates associated with interventions andmedications, surgical success rates, remission rates, and the like forretrieval through an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel.

In embodiments, interaction with syndicated summaries of interventioncomplication rates, medication side effects (e.g. incidence andprevalence), survival rates associated with interventions andmedications, surgical success rates, remission rates, and the likethrough an RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel may beassociated with an application 406 consisting of a client-side program.The client-side program may be formatted to operate on client devicessuch as, a desktop computer, laptop computer, “pocket” personalcomputer, a cellular phone, Blackberry, personal digital assistant, orother SMS text-enabled device, or the like.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated summaries of intervention complicationrates, medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survivalrates associated with interventions and medications, surgical successrates, remission rates, and the like may be associated with anaggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelused to interact with syndicated summaries of intervention complicationrates, medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survivalrates associated with interventions and medications, surgical successrates, remission rates, and the like may be associated with a contentmanagement system that may provide summaries of the syndicated dataavailable, dates associated with the syndicated data, links to accessthe full, non-summarized data, and the like.

In embodiments, researchers, physicians, healthcare providers,institutions, think tanks, regulatory bodies, accreditation groups, mayinteract with syndicated summaries of intervention complication rates,medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survival ratesassociated with interventions and medications, surgical success rates,remission rates, and the like through the use of an RSS-enabledapplication 406 providing for social networking and vertical marketintegration.

*[0042—AG'6 In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicatedsummaries of intervention complication rates, medication side effects(e.g. incidence and prevalence), survival rates associated withinterventions and medications, surgical success rates, remission rates,and the like through the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providinga user interface 700 for viewing data, records, and the like. Forexample, a client 102 may, in response to user input such as clicking ona title of an item in the user interface 700, retrieve the underlyingitem from the content source 204 as indicated by an arrow 208.

*[0042—AG'7 In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicatedsummaries of intervention complication rates, medication side effects(e.g. incidence and prevalence), survival rates associated withinterventions and medications, surgical success rates, remission rates,and the like through the use of an RSS-enabled application 406 providinga media viewer.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofintervention complication rates, medication side effects (e.g. incidenceand prevalence), survival rates associated with interventions andmedications, surgical success rates, remission rates, and the likeassociated with database functions that may permit the data quality tobe verified, provide for transformation of the data, enable searching,filtering, or clustering the patient data, or categorizing the data intohierarchies, interrelationships, interrelated groups, and the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofintervention complication rates, medication side effects (e.g. incidenceand prevalence), survival rates associated with interventions andmedications, surgical success rates, remission rates, and the likeassociated with semantic rules 412 that enable the creation of metadata.Semantic rules 412 may also provide for metadata enrichment,interpretation or translation of medical decision making trees, as wellas permit the creation of knowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) andthe use of a dictionary, thesaurus or the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofintervention complication rates, medication side effects (e.g. incidenceand prevalence), survival rates associated with interventions andmedications, surgical success rates, remission rates, and the likeindicators to which others may subscribe and/or publish. For example, acardiology patient may be able to subscribe and/or publish to an RSSfeed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channel, “HypertensionMedications” that regularly updates and retrieves data on side effectsassociated with extant and new hypertension medications, perhapsstratified by certain patient characteristics (e.g. age) and distributesthe information to the physicians within the practice.

In embodiments, the syndicated summaries of intervention complicationrates, medication side effects (e.g. incidence and prevalence), survivalrates associated with interventions and medications, surgical successrates, remission rates, and the like may be further associated withinformation that may provide for the management of the data. Forexample, the data may list the source of the records, the date on whichit was last updated, etc. Thus, the data may provide for furtheraggregation, republication, and the like.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofintervention complication rates, medication side effects (e.g. incidenceand prevalence), survival rates associated with interventions andmedications, surgical success rates, remission rates, and the likewithin an infrastructure 416 that provides for data security,authentication, management of the traffic created by the RSS feeds 202,web feeds, RSS streams, or RSS channels, logging and pinging technology,and/or other communications.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofintervention complication rates, medication side effects (e.g. incidenceand prevalence), survival rates associated with interventions andmedications, surgical success rates, remission rates, and the likeassociated with special formatting and/or display properties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofintervention complication rates, medication side effects (e.g. incidenceand prevalence), survival rates associated with interventions andmedications, surgical success rates, remission rates, and the likeassociated with special identification and/or transactional properties.

In embodiments, patients may interact with syndicated summaries ofintervention complication rates, medication side effects (e.g. incidenceand prevalence), survival rates associated with interventions andmedications, surgical success rates, remission rates, and the likeassociated with restricted or conditional access properties.

Referring again to FIG. 13, the syndicated data/information 1302 may bepatient information, patient record information, journal and researchinformation, decision making tree information, clinical standards ofcare information, congruence information, rate information, adverseevent information, matched patient record information, comparisoninformation, recipient information, comparative performance information,current status information, community medical information, treatmentinformation and treatment rate information, as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through anapplication/interface/other 1308. The users 1304 may also interact witheach other. The application/interface/other 1308 may be a client-sideprogram, such as the healthcare program discussed herein, a socialnetworking application, a user interface, such as user interface 700,800 and/or 900, an application in connection with a media viewer, amedia viewer and/or an application providing for vertical marketintegration, such as described herein. The application/interface/other1308 may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 13may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

Referring again to FIG. 14, the syndicated data/information 1302 may bepatient information, patient record information, journal and researchinformation, decision making tree information, clinical standards ofcare information, congruence information, rate information, adverseevent information, matched patient record information, comparisoninformation, recipient information, comparative performance information,current status information, community medical information, treatmentinformation and treatment rate information, as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a databasefunction 1402. The database function 1402 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The database function 1402 may be a databasefunction as described herein, such as related to data quality, datatransformation, searching, filtering, clustering, a search engine,information relationships, hierarchical relationships andcategorization, such as described herein. The database function 1402may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 14may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

Referring again to FIG. 15, the syndicated data/information 1302 may bepatient information, patient record information, journal and researchinformation, decision making tree information, clinical standards ofcare information, congruence information, rate information, adverseevent information, matched patient record information, comparisoninformation, recipient information, comparative performance information,current status information, community medical information, treatmentinformation and treatment rate information, as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a semanticfacility 1502. The semantic facility 1502 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The semantic facility 1502 may provide or berelated to semantic rules, metadata creation, metadata enrichment,interpretation of aggregated data, such as syndicated data/information1302, translation of aggregated data, such as syndicateddata/information 1302, creation of knowledge structures, a dictionaryand/or a thesaurus, such as described herein. The semantic facility 1502may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 15may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

Referring again to FIG. 16, the syndicated data/information 1302 may bepatient information, patient record information, journal and researchinformation, decision making tree information, clinical standards ofcare information, congruence information, rate information, adverseevent information, matched patient record information, comparisoninformation, recipient information, comparative performance information,current status information, community medical information, treatmentinformation and treatment rate information, as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through asyndication facility 1602. The syndication facility 1602 may alsointeract directly with the syndicated data/information 1302. The users1304 may also interact with each other. The syndication facility 1602may publish, subscribe to, aggregate and republish aggregated data, suchas syndicated data/information 1302, such as described herein. Thesyndication facility 1602 may also manage syndication information 1302,such as described herein. The syndication facility 1602 may, forexample, be deployed as a service in a services oriented architecture orusing the other techniques described above with reference to FIGS. 4 and5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 16 may be data feeds, suchas data feed 202. A user 1304 may also publish, republish and/orsubscribe to a content source 204, data feed 202, aggregator 210 and/orsyndication facility 1602.

Referring again to FIG. 17, the syndicated data/information 1302 may bepatient information, patient record information, journal and researchinformation, decision making tree information, clinical standards ofcare information, congruence information, rate information, adverseevent information, matched patient record information, comparisoninformation, recipient information, comparative performance information,current status information, community medical information, treatmentinformation and treatment rate information, as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, suchas users 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interactwith the syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through aninfrastructure 1702. The infrastructure 1702 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The infrastructure 1702 may provide or berelated to security, authentication, traffic management, logging,pinging and/or communications, such as described herein. Theinfrastructure 1702 may, for example, be deployed as a service in aservices oriented architecture or using the other techniques describedabove with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrowsof FIG. 17 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

Referring again to FIG. 18, the syndicated data/information 1302 may bepatient information, patient record information, journal and researchinformation, decision making tree information, clinical standards ofcare information, congruence information, rate information, adverseevent information, matched patient record information, comparisoninformation, recipient information, comparative performance information,current status information, community medical information, treatmentinformation and treatment rate information, as described herein. Thesyndicated data/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or mayoriginate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly.An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. The infrastructure1702 may also interact directly with the syndicated data/information1302. The users 1304 may also interact with each other. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may be associated with special properties 1802.The special properties 1802 may be related to formatting, display,identification, de-identification, transactions, restricted accessand/or conditional access, such as described herein. The specialproperties 1802 may also be associated with a service application 406,408, 410, 412, 414 and/or 416. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG.18 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

Practitioners of ordinary skill in the art will readily discern that thesystems and methods of the present invention are useful in therapeutic,diagnostic and administrative settings in a health care facility. Withmore specificity, these systems and methods may be useful for managing adiagnostic system, a therapeutic system, an administrative system orsome combination thereof in a health care facility. As used herein, theterm health care facility includes hospitals, clinics, outpatientcenters, community health centers, nursing homes, hospices and home caresettings, school health facilities, doctors' offices, mobile healthfacilities, morgues, mobile emergency or disaster response units,ambulances, labs, pharmacies, or any place, location, facility wherehealth or medical care and/or information relating to health or medicalcare is offered and/or provided. The term patient, as used herein, doesnot require that an abnormal state exists in that individual, and theterm includes individuals of all ages and further includes the unborn.

Diagnostic systems in a health care facility may be directed toidentifying the presence or absence of diseases or medical conditions,evaluating the severity of abnormalities or diseases, or predictingtheir prognosis. For example, an electrocardiogram, whether normal orabnormal, may be part of a diagnostic system generally useful ininternal medicine, cardiology and the like. Moreover, diagnostic systemsmay be useful in monitoring the response of a patient to a therapeuticintervention, or in predicting the response of a patient to atherapeutic intervention. Blood glucose tests, performed for examplewith a home blood glucose meter, may be part of a diagnostic systemgenerally useful in diabetes care as the patient's insulin doses arevaried or as the patient's lifestyle changes. As another example,measurement of estrogen receptors on a breast cancer specimen may bepart of a diagnostic system generally useful in oncology as anassessment of tumor susceptibility to tamoxifen. Diagnostic systems mayspecify a normal or abnormal profile in a patient who has not yetexhibited any signs or symptoms of disease. Identifying the presence ofa Huntington's chorea gene in a neurologically normal patient may bepart of a diagnostic system generally useful in predicting an extremelyhigh likelihood of developing this devastating neurological disorder.Similarly, identifying the presence of abnormally high cholesterol in anotherwise asymptomatic patient may be part of a diagnostic systemgenerally useful in predicting the likelihood of subsequentcardiovascular disease. Data pertaining to, used by, collected by orgenerated by a diagnostic system may be termed diagnostic data.

In more detail, diagnostic systems may include a variety of diagnosticdevices. Diagnostic devices may be used in a number of settings within ahealth care facility, including a laboratory setting, a diagnosticimaging setting and a clinical setting. Diagnostic devices in alaboratory setting may include devices used in measuring clinicalchemistry or toxicology profiles, in examining blood or tissue specimens(hematology, pathology, blood banking, tissue typing, etc.), inidentifying infectious agents (microbiology, virology, etc), inevaluating immunological profiles, in profiling gene patterns or proteinpatterns, and the like. Diagnostic devices in a diagnostic imagingsetting may include those devices that permit direct visualization ofbody parts or structures and capture of images therefrom (microscopes,endoscopes, etc.), those devices that utilize sound waves, Xrays,magnetic resonance or other forms or electromagnetic radiation, andthose devices that further involve administering a contrast medium or animaging agent (angiography, barium contrast studies, nuclear medicinestudies, etc.), and the like. Diagnostic devices in a clinical settingmay include devices useful for anesthesiology and critical care,cardiovascular medicine, dental practice, otorhinolaryngology(ear/nose/throat), gastroenterology, urology, general hospital andpersonal use, general and plastic surgery, obstetrics and gynecology,ophthalmology, physical medicine, and other clinical fields.Illustrative examples of diagnostic devices are set forth herein. It isunderstood that a diagnostic device may also be a combination deviceswhere one component satisfies a diagnostic function. A pulmonaryfunction device, for example, may provide a measurement of pulmonaryfunction parameters (a diagnostic function) and may also administer aninhaler treatment (a therapeutic function), optionally followed by asecond measurement of pulmonary function parameters. Combination devicesmay also include those diagnostic devices that combine a plurality ofdiagnostic functions.

Therapeutic systems in a health care facility may be directed toaltering or improving the course of a disease or of a physiological orpathological process. Interventions carried out to alter or improve thecourse of a disease or of a physiological or pathological process may bealso termed “treatments” or “therapies.” The therapeutic interventionsupplied by a therapeutic system need not be successful for the systemto be considered therapeutic, and the intervention need not yield anoverall health benefit. A therapeutic intervention may include aconventional medical intervention or a nontraditional interventionincluding chiropracty, naturopathy, herbalism, acupuncture, and thelike. Therapeutic systems may be invasive or noninvasive. Examples ofinvasive systems are those that entail a penetration of or an entry intoa body part. Injecting a substance into a patient, inserting anendoscope into a patient, removing a mole or an organ from a person, orsetting a patient's fracture are all invasive. By contrast, noninvasiveinterventions generally do not involve penetrating the body or enteringa natural or unnatural bodily orifice. Massage, ultrasonic physicaltherapy, and dental hygiene, for example, are noninvasive. Datapertaining to, used by, collected by or generated by a therapeuticsystem may be termed therapeutic data.

In more detail, therapeutic devices may include devices useful foranesthesiology and critical care, cardiovascular medicine, dentalpractice, otorhinolaryngology (ear/nose/throat), gastroenterology,urology, general hospital and personal use, general and plastic surgery,obstetrics and gynecology, ophthalmology, physical medicine, and otherclinical fields. Illustrative examples of therapeutic devices are setforth herein. It is understood that a therapeutic device may also be acombination devices where one component satisfies a therapeuticfunction. An endoscope, for example, may permit visualization of alesion (a diagnostic function) and placement of a dilating stent (atherapeutic function).

In embodiments, anesthesiology and critical carediagnostic andtherapeutic devices may be able to interact with syndicated data, orpublish one or more syndicated feeds. For example, anesthesiologydiagnostic and therapeutic devices may be able to publish syndicateddata, subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds, and storesyndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used, receivedand/or stored locally with the device, and/or in association with aremote architecture (e.g., server, database, etc.) accessible to thedevice (e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wireless connection,etc.). For example, a device such as an ultrasonic air embolism monitormay subscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published, shared, usedby the device's manufacturer to inform of device updates, recalls, andthe like. This information may be stored locally with the machine,and/or stored on an associated architecture, such as a hospital'scentral network, where the syndicated information may be reviewed bystaff. The device may also publish a syndicated data feed. This data mayinclude, but is not limited to, the performance of the device (e.g.,consistency with established safety parameters), the amount of deviceusage, personnel using the device, patients with whom the device wasoperated, and so forth.

Other anesthesiology and critical care diagnostic and therapeuticdevices that may interact with syndicated data in the above mannerinclude, but are not limited to a Powered algesimeter, Argon gasanalyzer, Indwelling blood oxyhemoglobin concentration analyzer,Indwelling blood carbon dioxide partial pressure (PCO2) analyzer,Indwelling blood hydrogen ion concentration (pH) analyzer, Indwellingblood oxygen partial pressure (PO2) analyzer, Carbon dioxide gasanalyzer, Carbon monoxide gas analyzer, Enflurane gas analyzer,Halothane gas analyzer, Helium gas analyzer, Neon gas analyzer, Nitrogengas analyzer, Nitrous oxide gas analyzer, Oxygen gas analyzer, Oxygenuptake computer, Pressure plethysmograph, Volume plethysmograph,Inspiratory airway pressure meter, Rhinoanemometer, Diagnosticspirometer, Monitoring spirometer, Peak-flow meter for spirometry, Gasvolume calibrator, Pulmonary-function data calculator, Predictivepulmonary-function value calculator, Diagnostic pulmonary-functioninterpretation calculator, Esophageal stethoscope with electricalconductors, Water vapor analyzer, Gas calibration flowmeter, Breathingfrequency monitor, Apnea monitor, Nitric oxide analyzer, Nitrogendioxide analyzer, Lung water monitor, Cutaneous carbon dioxide (PcCO2)monitor, Cutaneous oxygen (PcO2) monitor, Pneumotachometer, Airwaypressure monitor, Gas pressure gauge, Gas pressure calibrator, Pressureregulator, Electrical peripheral nerve stimulator, Differential pressuretransducer, Gas flow transducer, Gas pressure transducer, Gas machinefor anesthesia or analgesia, Nitric oxide administration apparatus,Breathing system heater, Breathing gas mixer, Heat and moisturecondenser (artificial nose), Electroanesthesia apparatus, Gas-scavengingapparatus, Portable oxygen generator, Hyperbaric chamber, Anesthetic gasmask, Nonrebreathing mask, Oxygen mask, Scavenging mask, Venturi mask,Membrane lung for long-term pulmonary support, Nebulizer, Portableliquid oxygen unit, Powered percussor, Nonpowered oxygen tent,Electrically powered oxygen tent, Autotransfusion apparatus, Anestheticvaporizer, Continuous ventilator, Noncontinuous ventilator (IPPB),Powered emergency ventilator, External negative pressure ventilator,i.e., iron lung, Intermittent mandatory ventilation attachment, or aPositive end expiratory pressure breathing attachment.

In embodiments, cardiovascular diagnostic and therapeutic devices may beable to interact with syndicated data, or publish one or more syndicatedfeeds. For example, cardiovascular diagnostic and therapeutic devicesmay be able to publish syndicated data, subscribe to and receivesyndicated data feeds, and store syndicated data. This data may bepublished, shared, used, received and/or stored locally with the device,and/or in association with a remote architecture (e.g., server,database, etc.) accessible to the device (e.g., through the internet,WAN, LAN, wireless connection, etc.). For example, a device such as anechocardiograph may subscribe to a syndicated data feed that ispublished, shared, used by the device's manufacturer to inform of deviceupdates, recalls, and the like. This information may be stored locallywith the machine, and/or stored on an associated architecture, such as ahospital's central network, where the syndicated information may bereviewed by staff. The device may also publish a syndicated data feed.This data may include, but is not limited to, the performance of thedevice (e.g., consistency with established safety parameters), theamount of device usage, personnel using the device, patients with whomthe device was operated, and so forth.

Other cardiovascular diagnostic and therapeutic devices that mayinteract with syndicated data in the above manner include, but are notlimited to a Arrhythmia detector and alarm (including ST-segmentmeasurement and alarm), Blood pressure alarm, Blood pressure computer,Blood pressure cuff, Noninvasive blood pressure measurement system,Venous blood pressure manometer, Diagnostic intravascular catheter,Continuous flush catheter, Electrode recording catheter or electroderecording probe, Fiberoptic oximeter catheter, Intracavitaryphonocatheter system, Steerable catheter, Steerable catheter controlsystem, Programmable diagnostic computer, Single-function, preprogrammeddiagnostic computer, Densitometer, Angiographic injector and syringe,Indicator injector, External programmable pacemaker pulse generator,Withdrawal-infusion pump, Thermodilution probe, Biopotential amplifierand signal conditioner, Transducer signal amplifier and conditioner,Cardiovascular blood flowmeter, Extravascular blood flow probe, Cardiacmonitor (including cardiotachometer and rate alarm), Apex cardiograph(vibrocardiograph), Ballistocardiograph, Electrocardiograph,Electrocardiograph lead switching adaptor, Electrocardiograph electrode,Electrocardiograph surface electrode tester, Phonocardiograph,Vectorcardiograph, Medical cathode-ray tube display, Signal isolationsystem, Line isolation monitor, Portable leakage current alarm,Oscillometer, Oximeter, Ear oximeter, Impedance phlebograph, Impedanceplethysmograph, Hydraulic, pneumatic, or photoelectric plethysmographs,Medical magnetic tape recorder, Paper chart recorder, Apex cardiographictransducer, Extravascular blood pressure transducer, Heart soundtransducer, Catheter tip pressure transducer, Ultrasonic transducer,Vessel occlusion transducer, Patient transducer and electrode cable(including connector), Radiofrequency physiological signal transmitterand receiver, Telephone electrocardiograph transmitter and receiver,Intra-aortic balloon and control system Ventricular bypass (assist)device, External pacemaker pulse generator, Implantable pacemaker pulsegenerator, Pacemaker lead adaptor, Pacemaker generator functionanalyzer, Indirect pacemaker generator function analyzer, Pacemakercharger, Cardiovascular permanent or temporary pacemaker electrode,Pacemaker test magnet, Pacemaker programmers, Pacemaker electrodefunction tester, Pacemaker service tools, Carotid sinus nervestimulator, Cardiopulmonary bypass accessory equipment, Cardiopulmonarybypass bubble detector, Cardiopulmonary bypass heart-lung machineconsole, Cardiopulmonary bypass defoamer, Cardiopulmonary bypass heatexchanger, Cardiopulmonary bypass temperature controller,Cardiopulmonary bypass gas control unit, Cardiopulmonary bypass coronarypressure gauge, Cardiopulmonary bypass pulsatile flow generator,Cardiopulmonary bypass on-line blood gas monitor, Cardiopulmonary bypasslevel sensing monitor and/or control, Cardiopulmonary bypass oxygenator,Nonroller-type cardiopulmonary bypass blood pump, Roller-typecardiopulmonary bypass blood pump, Cardiopulmonary bypass pump speedcontrol, Cardiopulmonary bypass in-line blood gas sensor,Cardiopulmonary bypass cardiotomy return sucker, Cardiopulmonary bypassintracardiac suction control, Patient care suction apparatus,Embolectomy catheter, Septostomy catheter, External cardiac compressor,External counter-pulsating device, DC-defibrillator (including paddles),Defibrillator tester, External transcutaneous cardiac pacemaker(noninvasive), Thermal regulating system, or a Automatic rotatingtourniquet.

In embodiments, clinical chemistry and clinical toxicology diagnosticand therapeutic devices may be able to interact with syndicated data, orpublish one or more syndicated feeds. For example, clinical chemistryand clinical toxicology diagnostic and therapeutic devices may be ableto publish syndicated data, subscribe to and receive syndicated datafeeds, and store syndicated data. This data may be published, shared,used, received and/or stored locally with the device, and/or inassociation with a remote architecture (e.g., server, database, etc.)accessible to the device (e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wirelessconnection, etc.). For example, a device such as an automated urinalysissystem may subscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published,shared, used by the device's manufacturer to inform of device updates,recalls, and the like. This information may be stored locally with themachine, and/or stored on an associated architecture, such as ahospital's central network, where the syndicated information may bereviewed by staff. The device may also publish a syndicated data feed.This data may include, but is not limited to, the performance of thedevice (e.g., consistency with established safety parameters), theamount of device usage, personnel using the device, patients with whomthe device was operated, and so forth.

Other clinical chemistry and clinical toxicology devices that mayinteract with syndicated data in the above manner include, but are notlimited to a Calibrator, Quality control material (assayed andunassayed), General purpose laboratory equipment, Calculator/dataprocessing module, Centrifugal chemistry analyzer, Continuous flowsequential multiple chemistry analyzer, Discrete photometric chemistryanalyzer, Micro chemistry analyzer, Gas liquid chromatography system,High pressure liquid chromatography system, Thin-layer chromatographysystem, Colorimeter, photometer, or spectrophotometer, Clinical sampleconcentrator, Beta or gamma counter, Densitometer/scanner (integrating,reflectance, TLC, or radiochromatogram), Electrophoresis apparatus,Enzyme analyzer, Flame emission photometer, Fluorometer, Microtitrator,Nephelometer, Plasma oncometer, Osmometer, Pipetting and dilutingsystem, Refractometer, Atomic absorption spectrophotometer, Massspectrometer, Plasma viscometer, or a Clinical toxicology calibrator.

In embodiments, clinical chemistry and clinical toxicology testingdevices may be able to interact with syndicated data, or publish one ormore syndicated feeds. For example, clinical chemistry and clinicaltoxicology testing devices may be able to publish syndicated data,subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds, and store syndicateddata. This data may be published, shared, used, received and/or storedlocally with the device, and/or in association with a remotearchitecture (e.g., server, database, etc.) accessible to the device(e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wireless connection, etc.). Forexample, a device such as an acid phosphatase (total or prostatic) testsystem may subscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published,shared, used by the device's manufacturer to inform of device updates,recalls, and the like. This information may be stored locally with themachine, and/or stored on an associated architecture, such as ahospital's central network, where the syndicated information may bereviewed by staff. The device may also publish a syndicated data feed.This data may include, but is not limited to, the performance of thedevice (e.g., consistency with established safety parameters), theamount of device usage, personnel using the device, patients with whomthe device was operated, and so forth.

Other clinical chemistry and clinical toxicology testing devices thatmay interact with syndicated data in the above manner include, but arenot limited to a Adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) test system, Alanineamino transferase, (ALT/SGPT) test system, Albumin test system, Aldolasetest system, Aldosterone test system, Alkaline phosphatase or isoenzymestest system, Delta-aminolevulinic acid test system, Ammonia test system,Amylase test system, Androstenedione test system, Androsterone testsystem, Angiotensin I and renin test system, Angiotensin convertingenzyme (A,C,E,) test system, Ascorbic acid test system, Aspartate aminotransferase (AST/SGOT) test system, Bilirubin (total or direct) testsystem, Bilirubin (total and unbound) in the neonate test system,Urinary bilirubin and its conjugates (nonquantitative) test system,B-type natriuretic peptide test system, Biotinidase test system, Bloodgases (PO2) and blood pH test system, Blood volume test system,C-peptides of proinsulin test system, Calcitonin test system, Calciumtest system, Human chorionic gonadotropin (HCG) test system,Bicarbonate/carbon dioxide test system, Catecholamines (total) testsystem, Chloride test system, Cholesterol (total) test system,Cholylglycine test system, Chymotrypsin test system, Compound S(11-deoxycortisol) test system, Conjugated sulfolithocholic acid (SLCG)test system, Copper test system, Corticoids test system, Corticosteronetest system, Cortisol (hydrocortisone and hydroxycorticosterone) testsystem, Creatine test system, Creatine phosphokinase/creatine kinase orisoenzymes test system, Creatinine test system, Cyclic AMP test system,Cyclosporine test system, Cystine test system, Dehydroepiandrosterone(free and sulfate) test system, Desoxycorticosterone test system,2,3-Diphosphoglyceric acid test system, Estradiol test system, Estrioltest system, Estrogens (total, in pregnancy) test system, Estrogens(total, nonpregnancy) test system, Estrone test system, Etiocholanolonetest system, Fatty acids test system, Folic acid test system,Follicle-stimulating hormone test system, Formiminoglutamic acid (FIGLU)test system, Galactose test system, Galactose-1-phosphate uridyltransferase test system, Gastric acidity test system, Gastrin testsystem, Globulin test system, Glucagon test system, Urinary glucose(nonquantitative) test system, Glucose test system, Gamma-glutamyltranspeptidase and isoenzymes test system, Glutathione test system,Human growth hormone test system, Histidine test system, Urinaryhomocystine (nonquantitative) test system, Hydroxybutyric dehydrogenasetest system, 17-Hydroxycorticosteroids (17-ketogenic steroids) testsystem, 5-Hydroxyindole acetic acid/serotonin test system,17-Hydroxyprogesterone test system, Hydroxyproline test system,Immunoreactive insulin test system, Iron (non-heme) test system,Iron-binding capacity test system, Isocitric dehydrogenase test system,17-Ketosteroids test system, Ketones (nonquantitative) test system,Lactate dehydrogenase test system, Lactate dehydrogenase isoenzymes testsystem, Lactic acid test system, Lecithin/sphingomyelin ratio inamniotic fluid test system, Leucine aminopeptidase test system, Lipasetest system, Lipid (total) test system, Lipoprotein test system,Luteinizing hormone test system, Lysozyme (muramidase) test system,Magnesium test system, Malic dehydrogenase test system,Mucopolysaccharides (nonquantitative) test system, Methylmalonic acid(nonquantitative) test system, Nitrite (nonquantitative) test system,Nitrogen (amino-nitrogen) test system, 5′-Nucleotidase test system,Plasma oncometry test system, Omithine carbamyl transferase test system,Osmolality test system, Oxalate test system, Parathyroid hormone testsystem, Urinary pH (nonquantitative) test system, Phenylalanine testsystem, Urinary phenylketones (nonquantitative) test system,6-Phosphogluconate dehydrogenase test system, Phosphohexose isomerasetest system, Phospholipid test system, Phosphorus (inorganic) testsystem, Human placental lactogen test system, Porphobilinogen testsystem, Porphyrins test system, Potassium test system, Pregnanediol testsystem, Pregnanetriol test system, Pregnenolone test system,Progesterone test system, Prolactin (lactogen) test system, Protein(fractionation) test system, Total protein test system, Protein-boundiodine test system, Urinary protein or albumin (nonquantitative) testsystem, Pyruvate kinase test system, Pyruvic acid test system, Sodiumtest system, Sorbitol dehydrogenase test system, Tacrolimus test system,Testosterone test system, Thyroxine-binding globulin test system,Thyroid stimulating hormone test system, Free thyroxine test system,Total thyroxine test system, Triglyceride test system, Totaltriiodothyronine test system, Triiodothyronine uptake test system,Triose phosphate isomerase test system, Trypsin test system, Freetyrosine test system, Urea nitrogen test system, Uric acid test system,Urinary calculi (stones) test system, Urinary urobilinogen(nonquantitative) test system, Uroporphyrin test system, Vanilmandelicacid test system, Vitamin A test system, Vitamin B[bdi1][bdi2] testsystem, Vitamin E test system, Xylose test system, Vitamin D testsystem, Acetaminophen test system, Amikacin test system, Alcohol testsystem, Breath-alcohol test system, Amphetamine test system, Antimonytest system, Arsenic test system, Barbiturate test system,Benzodiazepine test system, Clinical toxicology calibrator, Carbonmonoxide test system, Cholinesterase test system, Cocaine and cocainemetabolite test system, Codeine test system, Digitoxin test system,Digoxin test system, Diphenylhydantoin test system, Ethosuximide testsystem, Gentamicin test system, Kanamycin test system, Lead test system,Lidocaine test system, Lithium test system, Lysergic acid diethylamide(LSD) test system, Mercury test system, Methamphetamine test system,Methadone test system, Methaqualone test system, Morphine test system,Neuroleptic drugs radioreceptor assay test system, Opiate test system,Phenobarbital test system, Phenothiazine test system, Primidone testsystem, Propoxyphene test system, Quinine test system, Salicylate testsystem, Sulfonamide test system, Cannabinoid test system, Theophyllinetest system, Tobramycin test system, Tricyclic antidepressant drugs testsystem, or a Vancomycin test system.

In embodiments, dental diagnostic and therapeutic devices may be able tointeract with syndicated data, or publish one or more syndicated feedsmay be able to interact with syndicated data, or publish one or moresyndicated feeds, or publish one or more syndicated feeds. For example,dental diagnostic and therapeutic devices may be able to publishsyndicated data, subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds, andstore syndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used,received and/or stored locally with the device, and/or in associationwith a remote architecture (e.g., server, database, etc.) accessible tothe device (e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wireless connection,etc.). For example, a device such as a caries detection device maysubscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published, shared, used bythe device's manufacturer to inform of device updates, recalls, and thelike. This information may be stored locally with the machine, and/orstored on an associated architecture, such as a hospital's centralnetwork, where the syndicated information may be reviewed by staff. Thedevice may also publish a syndicated data feed. This data may include,but is not limited to, the performance of the device (e.g., consistencywith established safety parameters), the amount of device usage,personnel using the device, patients with whom the device was operated,and so forth.

Other dental diagnostic and therapeutic devices that may interact withsyndicated data in the above manner include, but are not limited to aPulp tester, Laser fluorescence caries detection device, Extraoralsource x-ray system, Intraoral source x-ray system, Dental x-rayexposure alignment device, Cephalometer, Sulfide detection device,Pantograph, Intraoral dental drill, Dental handpiece and accessories,Rotary scaler, Ultrasonic scaler, Dental electrosurgical unit andaccessories, Airbrush, Anesthetic warmer, Dental chair and accessories,Heat source for bleaching teeth, Dental operative unit and accessories,Boiling water sterilizer, or a Endodontic dry heat sterilizer.

In embodiments, ear, nose and throat diagnostic and therapeutic devicesmay be able to interact with syndicated data, or publish one or moresyndicated feeds may be able to interact with syndicated data, orpublish one or more syndicated feeds, or publish one or more syndicatedfeeds. For example, ear, nose and throat diagnostic and therapeuticdevices may be able to publish syndicated data, subscribe to and receivesyndicated data feeds, and store syndicated data. This data may bepublished, shared, used, received and/or stored locally with the device,and/or in association with a remote architecture (e.g., server,database, etc.) accessible to the device (e.g., through the internet,WAN, LAN, wireless connection, etc.). For example, a device such as anaudiometer may subscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published,shared, used by the device's manufacturer to inform of device updates,recalls, and the like. This information may be stored locally with themachine, and/or stored on an associated architecture, such as ahospital's central network, where the syndicated information may bereviewed by staff. The device may also publish a syndicated data feed.This data may include, but is not limited to, the performance of thedevice (e.g., consistency with established safety parameters), theamount of device usage, personnel using the device, patients with whomthe device was operated, and so forth.

Other ear, nose and throat diagnostic and therapeutic devices that mayinteract with syndicated data in the above manner include, but are notlimited to a Acoustic chamber for audiometric testing, Short incrementsensitivity index (SISI) adapter, Audiometer calibration set, Auditoryimpedance tester, Electronic noise generator for audiometric testing,Electroglottograph, Gustometer, Air or water caloric stimulator,Surgical nerve stimulator/locator, Toynbee diagnostic tube, Hearing Aid,Hearing aid calibrator and analysis system, Master hearing aid, Tinnitusmasker, Ear, nose, and throat electric or pneumatic surgical drill, Ear,nose, and throat fiberoptic light source and carrier, Argon laser forotology, rhinology, and laryngology, Ear, nose, and throat microsurgicalcarbon dioxide laser, Bronchoscope (flexible or rigid) and accessories,Esophagoscope (flexible or rigid) and accessories, Mediastinoscope andaccessories, Laryngostroboscope, Nasopharyngoscope (flexible or rigid)and accessories, Otoscope, Ear, nose, and throat drug administrationdevice, Ear, nose, and throat examination and treatment unit, Suctionantichoke device, Tongs antichoke device, or a Antistammering device.

In embodiments, gastroenterology and urology diagnostic and therapeuticdevices may be able to interact with syndicated data, or publish one ormore syndicated feeds may be able to interact with syndicated data, orpublish one or more syndicated feeds, or publish one or more syndicatedfeeds. For example, gastroenterology and urology diagnostic andtherapeutic devices may be able to publish syndicated data, subscribe toand receive syndicated data feeds, and store syndicated data. This datamay be published, shared, used, received and/or stored locally with thedevice, and/or in association with a remote architecture (e.g., server,database, etc.) accessible to the device (e.g., through the internet,WAN, LAN, wireless connection, etc.). For example, a device such as anendoscope may subscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published,shared, used by the device's manufacturer to inform of device updates,recalls, and the like. This information may be stored locally with themachine, and/or stored on an associated architecture, such as ahospital's central network, where the syndicated information may bereviewed by staff. The device may also publish a syndicated data feed.This data may include, but is not limited to, the performance of thedevice (e.g., consistency with established safety parameters), theamount of device usage, personnel using the device, patients with whomthe device was operated, and so forth.

Other gastroenterology and urology diagnostic and therapeutic devicesthat may interact with syndicated data in the above manner include, butare not limited to a Ingestible telemetric gastrointestinal capsuleimaging system, Stomach pH electrode, Urodynamics measurement system,Gastrointestinal motility monitoring system, Electrogastrography system,Urine flow or volume measuring system, Enuresis alarm, Penile inflatableimplant, Endoscopic electrosurgical unit and accessories,Gastroenterology-urology evacuator, Electrohydraulic lithotriptor,Ureteral stone dislodger, Urological table and accessories, Colonicirrigation system, Implanted electrical urinary continence device,Nonimplanted, peripheral electrical continence device, Nonimplantedelectrical continence device, Sorbent regenerated dialysate deliverysystem for hemodialysis, Peritoneal dialysis system and accessories,Water purification system for hemodialysis, Hemodialysis system andaccessories, Hemodialyzer with disposable insert (Kiil type), Highpermeability hemodialysis system, Sorbent hemoperfusion system, Isolatedkidney perfusion and transport system and accessories, or aExtracorporeal shock wave lithotripter.

In embodiments, general and plastic surgery diagnostic and therapeuticdevices may be able to interact with syndicated data, or publish one ormore syndicated feeds may be able to interact with syndicated data, orpublish one or more syndicated feeds, or publish one or more syndicatedfeeds. For example, general and plastic surgery diagnostic andtherapeutic devices may be able to publish syndicated data, subscribe toand receive syndicated data feeds, and store syndicated data. This datamay be published, shared, used, received and/or stored locally with thedevice, and/or in association with a remote architecture (e.g., server,database, etc.) accessible to the device (e.g., through the internet,WAN, LAN, wireless connection, etc.). For example, a device such as asuction lipoplasty system may subscribe to a syndicated data feed thatis published, shared, used by the device's manufacturer to inform ofdevice updates, recalls, and the like. This information may be storedlocally with the machine, and/or stored on an associated architecture,such as a hospital's central network, where the syndicated informationmay be reviewed by staff. The device may also publish a syndicated datafeed. This data may include, but is not limited to, the performance ofthe device (e.g., consistency with established safety parameters), theamount of device usage, personnel using the device, patients with whomthe device was operated, and so forth.

Other general and plastic surgery diagnostic and therapeutic devicesthat may interact with syndicated data in the above manner include, butare not limited to a Surgical camera and accessories, Cryosurgical unitand accessories, Electrosurgical cutting and coagulation device andaccessories, Ultraviolet lamp for dermatologic disorders, Surgicalmicroscope and accessories, Powered suction pump, Laser surgicalinstrument for use in general and plastic surgery and in dermatology,Surgical instrument motors and accessories/attachments, Operating tablesand accessories and operating chairs and accessories, Air-handlingapparatus for a surgical operating room, Topical oxygen chamber forextremities, or a Pneumatic tourniquet.

In embodiments, general hospital and personal use diagnostic andtherapeutic devices may be able to interact with syndicated data, orpublish one or more syndicated feeds may be able to interact withsyndicated data, or publish one or more syndicated feeds, or publish oneor more syndicated feeds. For example, general hospital and personal usediagnostic and therapeutic devices may be able to publish syndicateddata, subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds, and storesyndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used, receivedand/or stored locally with the device, and/or in association with aremote architecture (e.g., server, database, etc.) accessible to thedevice (e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wireless connection,etc.). For example, a device such as a spinal fluid pressure monitor maysubscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published, shared, used bythe device's manufacturer to inform of device updates, recalls, and thelike. This information may be stored locally with the machine, and/orstored on an associated architecture, such as a hospital's centralnetwork, where the syndicated information may be reviewed by staff. Thedevice may also publish a syndicated data feed. This data may include,but is not limited to, the performance of the device (e.g., consistencywith established safety parameters), the amount of device usage,personnel using the device, patients with whom the device was operated,and so forth.

Other general hospital and personal use diagnostic and therapeuticdevices that may interact with syndicated data in the above mannerinclude, but are not limited to a Liquid crystal forehead temperaturestrip, Bed-patient monitor, Electronic monitor for gravity flow infusionsystems, Clinical color change thermometer, Clinical electronicthermometer, Clinical mercury thermometer, Apgar timer, AC-poweredadjustable hospital bed, Hydraulic adjustable hospital bed, Infantradiant warmer, Pediatric hospital bed, Neonatal incubator, Neonataltransport incubator, Patient care reverse isolation chamber, Alternatingpressure air flotation mattress, Temperature regulated water mattress,Pediatric position holder, Neonatal phototherapy unit, Infusion pump,Medical chair and table, Ultrasonic cleaner for medical instruments,AC-powered medical examination light, Liquid medication dispenser,Medical ultraviolet air purifier, Medical ultraviolet water purifier,Vacuum-powered body fluid suction apparatus, Ethylene oxide gassterilizer, Dry-heat sterilizer, Steam sterilizer, or a Liquid crystalvein locator.

In embodiments, hematology and pathology diagnostic and therapeuticdevices may be able to interact with syndicated data, or publish one ormore syndicated feeds may be able to interact with syndicated data, orpublish one or more syndicated feeds, or publish one or more syndicatedfeeds. For example, hematology and pathology devices may be able topublish syndicated data, subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds,and store syndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used,received and/or stored locally with the device, and/or in associationwith a remote architecture (e.g., server, database, etc.) accessible tothe device (e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wireless connection,etc.). For example, a device such as a cytocentrifuge may subscribe to asyndicated data feed that is published, shared, used by the device'smanufacturer to inform of device updates, recalls, and the like. Thisinformation may be stored locally with the machine, and/or stored on anassociated architecture, such as a hospital's central network, where thesyndicated information may be reviewed by staff. The device may alsopublish a syndicated data feed. This data may include, but is notlimited to, the performance of the device (e.g., consistency withestablished safety parameters), the amount of device usage, personnelusing the device, patients with whom the device was operated, and soforth.

Other hematology and pathology devices that may interact with syndicateddata in the above manner include, but are not limited to a Cell andtissue culture supplies and equipment, Mycoplasma detection media andcomponents, Tissue processing equipment, Device for sealingmicrosections, Microscopes and accessories, Automated slide stainer,Automated tissue processor, Automated cell counter, Automateddifferential cell counter, Automated blood cell diluting apparatus,Automated cell-locating device, Red cell indices device,Microsedimentation centrifuge, Coagulation instrument, Multipurposesystem for in vitro coagulation studies, Automated hematocritinstrument, Automated hemoglobin system, Automated heparin analyzer,Automated platelet aggregation system, Automated sedimentation ratedevice, Automated slide spinner, Blood volume measuring device, Bleedingtime device, Electrophoretic hemoglobin analysis system, Calibrator forcell indices, Calibrator for hemoglobin or hematocrit measurement,Calibrator for platelet counting, Calibrator for red cell and white cellcounting, Automated blood grouping and antibody test system, Bloodgrouping view box, Blood mixing devices and blood weighing devices,Blood and plasma warming device, Cell-freezing apparatus and reagentsfor in vitro diagnostic use, Automated blood cell separator, Blood bankcentrifuge for in vitro diagnostic use, Automated cell-washingcentrifuge for immuno-hematology, Automated Coombs test systems,Environmental chamber for storage of platelet concentrate, Blood storagerefrigerator and blood storage freezer, Heat-sealing device, Hematocritmeasuring device, Occult blood test, Osmotic fragility test, Plateletadhesion test, Platelet aggregometer, Erythrocyte sedimentation ratetest, Adenosine triphosphate release assay, Antithrombin III assay, Redblood cell enzyme assay, Activated whole blood clotting time tests,Erythropoietin assay, Euglobulin lysis time tests, Factor deficiencytest, Fibrin monomer paracoagulation test, Fibrinogen/fibrin degradationproducts assay, Fibrinogen determination system, Erythrocyticglucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase assay, Glutathione reductase assay,Hemoglobin A[bdi2] assay, Abnormal hemoglobin assay, Carboxyhemoglobinassay, Fetal hemoglobin assay, Glycosylated hemoglobin assay,Sulfhemoglobin assay, Whole blood hemoglobin assays, Heparin assay,Leukocyte alkaline phosphatase test, Leukocyte peroxidase test, Plateletfactor 4 radioimmunoassay, Prothrombin consumption test,Prothrombin-proconvertin test and thrombotest, Prothrombin time test,Sickle cell test, Thrombin time test, Thromboplastin generation test, ora Partial thromboplastin time test.

In embodiments, immunology and microbiology diagnostic and therapeuticdevices may be able to interact with syndicated data, or publish one ormore syndicated feeds may be able to interact with syndicated data, orpublish one or more syndicated feeds, or publish one or more syndicatedfeeds. For example, immunology and microbiology devices may be able topublish syndicated data, subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds,and store syndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used,received and/or stored locally with the device, and/or in associationwith a remote architecture (e.g., server, database, etc.) accessible tothe device (e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wireless connection,etc.). For example, a device such as an anaerobic chamber may subscribeto a syndicated data feed that is published, shared, used by thedevice's manufacturer to inform of device updates, recalls, and thelike. This information may be stored locally with the machine, and/orstored on an associated architecture, such as a hospital's centralnetwork, where the syndicated information may be reviewed by staff. Thedevice may also publish a syndicated data feed. This data may include,but is not limited to, the performance of the device (e.g., consistencywith established safety parameters), the amount of device usage,personnel using the device, patients with whom the device was operated,and so forth.

Other immunology and microbiology devices that may interact withsyndicated data in the above manner include, but are not limited to aFully automated short-term incubation cycle antimicrobial susceptibilitysystem, Automated colony counter, Automated medium dispensing andstacking device, Microtiter diluting and dispensing device,Microbiological incubator, Microbial growth monitor, Automated zonereader, Immunoelectrophoresis equipment, Immunofluorometer equipment,Immunonephelometer equipment, or Rocket immunoelectrophoresis equipment.

In embodiments, immunology and microbiology testing devices may be ableto interact with syndicated data, or publish one or more syndicatedfeeds may be able to interact with syndicated data, or publish one ormore syndicated feeds, or publish one or more syndicated feeds. Forexample, immunology and microbiology testing devices may be able topublish syndicated data, subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds,and store syndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used,received and/or stored locally with the device, and/or in associationwith a remote architecture (e.g., server, database, etc.) accessible tothe device (e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wireless connection,etc.). For example, a device such as a C-reactive protein immunologicaltest system may subscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published,shared, used by the device's manufacturer to inform of device updates,recalls, and the like. This information may be stored locally with themachine, and/or stored on an associated architecture, such as ahospital's central network, where the syndicated information may bereviewed by staff. The device may also publish a syndicated data feed.This data may include, but is not limited to, the performance of thedevice (e.g., consistency with established safety parameters), theamount of device usage, personnel using the device, patients with whomthe device was operated, and so forth.

Other immunology and microbiology testing devices that may interact withsyndicated data in the above manner include, but are not limited to aAlbumin immunological test system, Prealbumin immunological test system,Human allotypic marker immunological test system,Alpha-1-antichymotrypsin immunological test system, Antimitochondrialantibody immunological test system, Antinuclear antibody immunologicaltest system, Antiparietal antibody immunological test system, Antismoothmuscle antibody immunological test system, Alpha-1-antitrypsinimmunological test system, Bence-Jones proteins immunological testsystem, Beta-globulin immunological test system, Breast milkimmunological test system, Carbonic anhydrase B and C immunological testsystem, Ceruloplasmin immunological test system, Cohn fraction IIimmunological test system, Colostrum immunological test system,Complement components immunological test system, Complement C[bdi2]inhibitor (inactivator) immunological test system, Complement C3binactivator immunological test system, Properdin factor B immunologicaltest system, Factor XIII, A, S, immunological test system, Ferritinimmunological test system, Fibrinopeptide A immunological test system,Cohn fraction IV immunological test system, Cohn fraction Vimmunological test system, Free secretory component immunological testsystem, Alpha-globulin immunological test system, Alpha-1-glycoproteinsimmunological test system, Alpha-2-glycoproteins immunological testsystem, Beta-2-glycoprotein I immunological test system,Beta-2-glycoprotein III immunological test system, Haptoglobinimmunological test system, Hemoglobin immunological test system,Hemopexin immunological test system, Hypersensitivity pneumonitisimmunological test system, Immunoglobulins A, G, M, D, and Eimmunological test system, Immunoglobulin G (Fab fragment specific)immunological test system, Immunoglobulin G (Fc fragment specific)immunological test system, Immunoglobulin G (Fd fragment specific)immunological test system, Immunoglobulin (light chain specific)immunological test system, Lactic dehydrogenase immunological testsystem, Lactoferrin immunological test system, Alpha-1-lipoproteinimmunological test system, Lipoprotein X immunological test system,Low-density lipoprotein immunological test system, Alpha-2-macroglobulinimmunological test system, Beta-2 microglobulin immunological testsystem, Infectious mononucleosis immunological test system, Multipleautoantibodies immunological test system, Myoglobin immunological testsystem, Whole human plasma or serum immunological test system,Plasminogen immunological test system, Prothrombin immunological testsystem, Radioallergosorbent (RAST) immunological test system,Retinol-binding protein immunological test system, Rheumatoid factorimmunological test system, Anti-Saccharomyces cerevisiae (S, cerevisiae)antibody (ASCA) test systems, Seminal fluid (sperm) immunological testsystem, Systemic lupus erythematosus immunological test system, Totalspinal fluid immunological test system, Thyroid autoantibodyimmunological test system, Transferrin immunological test system,Inter-alpha trypsin inhibitor immunological test system, or aTumor-associated antigen immunological test system.

In embodiments, mammography devices may be able to interact withsyndicated data, or publish one or more syndicated feeds may be able tointeract with syndicated data, or publish one or more syndicated feeds,or publish one or more syndicated feeds. For example, mammographydevices may be able to publish syndicated data, subscribe to and receivesyndicated data feeds, and store syndicated data. This data may bepublished, shared, used, received and/or stored locally with the device,and/or in association with a remote architecture (e.g., server,database, etc.) accessible to the device (e.g., through the internet,WAN, LAN, wireless connection, etc.). For example, a device such as ascreen-film mammography device may subscribe to a syndicated data feedthat is published, shared, used by the device's manufacturer to informof device updates, recalls, and the like. This information may be storedlocally with the machine, and/or stored on an associated architecture,such as a hospital's central network, where the syndicated informationmay be reviewed by staff. The device may also publish a syndicated datafeed. This data may include, but is not limited to, the performance ofthe device (e.g., consistency with established safety parameters), theamount of device usage, personnel using the device, patients with whomthe device was operated, and so forth.

Other mammography devices that may interact with syndicated data in theabove manner include, but are not limited to, xeromammography,mammography unit or image processor, X-ray generator, an X-ray control,a tube housing assembly, a beam limiting device, and/or the supportingstructures for these components.

In embodiments, neurological diagnostic and therapeutic devices may beable to interact with syndicated data, or publish one or more syndicatedfeeds may be able to interact with syndicated data, or publish one ormore syndicated feeds, or publish one or more syndicated feeds. Forexample, neurological diagnostic and therapeutic devices may be able topublish syndicated data, subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds,and store syndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used,received and/or stored locally with the device, and/or in associationwith a remote architecture (e.g., server, database, etc.) accessible tothe device (e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wireless connection,etc.). For example, a device such as an ataxiagraph may subscribe to asyndicated data feed that is published, shared, used by the device'smanufacturer to inform of device updates, recalls, and the like. Thisinformation may be stored locally with the machine, and/or stored on anassociated architecture, such as a hospital's central network, where thesyndicated information may be reviewed by staff. The device may alsopublish a syndicated data feed. This data may include, but is notlimited to, the performance of the device (e.g., consistency withestablished safety parameters), the amount of device usage, personnelusing the device, patients with whom the device was operated, and soforth.

Other neurological diagnostic and therapeutic devices that may interactwith syndicated data in the above manner include, but are not limited toa Rigidity analyzer, Two-point discriminator, Echoencephalograph,Cortical electrode, Cutaneous electrode, Depth electrode, Nasopharyngealelectrode, Needle electrode, Electroencephalograph,Electroencephalograph electrode/lead tester, Electroencephalogram (EEG)signal spectrum analyzer, Electroencephalograph test signal generator,Nystagmograph, Neurological endoscope, Galvanic skin responsemeasurement device, Nerve conduction velocity measurement device, Skinpotential measurement device, Powered direct-contact temperaturemeasurement device, Alpha monitor, Intracranial pressure monitoringdevice, Ocular plethysmograph, Rheoencephalograph, Physiological signalamplifier, Physiological signal conditioner, Evoked response electricalstimulator, Evoked response mechanical stimulator, Evoked responsephotic stimulator, Evoked response auditory stimulator, Ultrasonicscanner calibration test block, Tremor transducer, Neurosurgical chair,Cryogenic surgical device, Powered compound cranial drills, burrs,trephines, and their accessories, Powered simple cranial drills, burrs,trephines, and their accessories, Electric cranial drill motor,Pneumatic cranial drill motor, Radiofrequency lesion generator,Neurosurgical headrests, Neurosurgical head holder (skull clamp),Microsurgical instrument, Stereotaxic instrument, Leukotome,Radiofrequency lesion probe, Skull punch, Powered rongeur, Skullplatescrewdriver, Biofeedback device, Aversive conditioning device, Lesiontemperature monitor, Cranial electrotheraphy stimulator, Externalfunctional neuromuscular stimulator, Implanted cerebellar stimulator,Implanted diaphragmatic/phrenic nerve stimulator, Implantedintracerebral/subcortical stimulator for pain relief, Implanted spinalcord stimulator for bladder evacuation, Implanted neuromuscularstimulator, Implanted peripheral nerve stimulator for pain relief,Implanted spinal cord stimulator for pain relief, Transcutaneouselectrical nerve stimulator for pain relief, Electroconvulsive therapydevice, or a Cranial orthosis,

In embodiments, obstetrical and gynecological diagnostic and therapeuticdevices may be able to interact with syndicated data, or publish one ormore syndicated feeds may be able to interact with syndicated data, orpublish one or more syndicated feeds, or publish one or more syndicatedfeeds. For example, obstetrical and gynecological diagnostic andtherapeutic devices may be able to publish syndicated data, subscribe toand receive syndicated data feeds, and store syndicated data. This datamay be published, shared, used, received and/or stored locally with thedevice, and/or in association with a remote architecture (e.g., server,database, etc.) accessible to the device (e.g., through the internet,WAN, LAN, wireless connection, etc.). For example, a device such as anuterotubal carbon dioxide insufflator may subscribe to a syndicated datafeed that is published, shared, used by the device's manufacturer toinform of device updates, recalls, and the like. This information may bestored locally with the machine, and/or stored on an associatedarchitecture, such as a hospital's central network, where the syndicatedinformation may be reviewed by staff. The device may also publish asyndicated data feed. This data may include, but is not limited to, theperformance of the device (e.g., consistency with established safetyparameters), the amount of device usage, personnel using the device,patients with whom the device was operated, and so forth.

Other obstetrical and gynecological diagnostic and therapeutic devicesthat may interact with syndicated data in the above manner include, butare not limited to a Viscometer for cervical mucus, Transabdominalamnioscope (fetoscope) and accessories, Colposcope, Culdoscope andaccessories, Transcervical endoscope (amnioscope) and accessories,Hysteroscope and accessories, Hysteroscopic insufflator, Gynecologiclaparoscope and accessories, Laparoscopic insufflator, Obstetric dataanalyzer, Obstetric-gynecologic ultrasonic imager, Fetal cardiacmonitor, Fetal electroencephalographic monitor, Fetal phonocardiographicmonitor and accessories, Fetal ultrasonic monitor and accessories, Fetalscalp circular (spiral) electrode and applicator, Fetal scalp clipelectrode and applicator, Intrauterine pressure monitor and accessories,External uterine contraction monitor and accessories, Home uterineactivity monitor, Perinatal monitoring system and accessories, Fetalstethoscope, Obstetric ultrasonic transducer and accessories,Telethermographic system, Liquid crystal thermographic system,Endoscopic electrocautery and accessories, Gynecologic electrocauteryand accessories, Bipolar endoscopic coagulator-cutter and accessories,Unipolar endoscopic coagulator-cutter and accessories, Fetal vacuumextractor, Gynecologic surgical laser, Obstetric table and accessories,Metreurynter-balloon abortion system, Vacuum abortion system, Abdominaldecompression chamber, Powered vaginal muscle stimulator for therapeuticuse, or Assisted reproduction water and water purification systems,

In embodiments, ophthalmic diagnostic and therapeutic devices may beable to interact with syndicated data, or publish one or more syndicatedfeeds may be able to interact with syndicated data, or publish one ormore syndicated feeds, or publish one or more syndicated feeds. Forexample, ophthalmic diagnostic and therapeutic devices may be able topublish syndicated data, subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds,and store syndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used,received and/or stored locally with the device, and/or in associationwith a remote architecture (e.g., server, database, etc.) accessible tothe device (e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wireless connection,etc.). For example, a device such as an adaptometer (biophotometer) maysubscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published, shared, used bythe device's manufacturer to inform of device updates, recalls, and thelike. This information may be stored locally with the machine, and/orstored on an associated architecture, such as a hospital's centralnetwork, where the syndicated information may be reviewed by staff. Thedevice may also publish a syndicated data feed. This data may include,but is not limited to, the performance of the device (e.g., consistencywith established safety parameters), the amount of device usage,personnel using the device, patients with whom the device was operated,and so forth.

Other ophthalmic diagnostic and therapeutic devices that may interactwith syndicated data in the above manner include, but are not limited toa Anomaloscope, Haidlinger brush, Opthalmic camera, Ophthalmic chair,Color vision plate illuminator, Distometer, Optokinetic drum, Cornealelectrode, Euthyscope, Exophthalmometer, Fixation device, Afterimageflasher, Haploscope, Keratoscope, Visual field laser instrument, Lensmeasuring instrument, Ophthalmic contact lens radius measuring device,Maxwell spot, Corneal radius measuring device, Stereopsis measuringinstrument, Eye movement monitor, Ophthalmoscope, Perimeter, AC-poweredphotostimulator, Ophthalmic preamplifier, Ophthalmic bar prism,Ophthalmic rotary prism, Ophthalmic isotope uptake probe, Ophthalmicprojector, Pupillograph, Pupillometer, Ophthalmic refractometer,Retinoscope, Tangent screen (campimeter), Stereoscope, Tonometer andaccessories, Powered corneal burr, Radiofrequency electrosurgicalcautery apparatus, Thermal cautery unit, Vitreous aspiration and cuttinginstrument, Cryophthalmic unit, Ophthalmic electrolysis unit,Intraocular pressure measuring device, Ocular surgery irrigation device,(adaptable—electronic control) Keratome, Ophthalmic laser, Nd:YAG laserfor posterior capsulotomy and peripheral iridotomy, Electronic metallocator, AC-powered magnet, Phacofragmentation system, Ophthalmicphotocoagulator,

Ophthalmic instrument table, Ophthalmic beta radiation source,Closed-circuit television reading system, or an Electronic vision aid.

In embodiments, physical medicine diagnostic and therapeutic devices maybe able to interact with syndicated data, or publish one or moresyndicated feeds may be able to interact with syndicated data, orpublish one or more syndicated feeds, or publish one or more syndicatedfeeds. For example, physical medicine diagnostic and therapeutic devicesmay be able to publish syndicated data, subscribe to and receivesyndicated data feeds, and store syndicated data. This data may bepublished, shared, used, received and/or stored locally with the device,and/or in association with a remote architecture (e.g., server,database, etc.) accessible to the device (e.g., through the internet,WAN, LAN, wireless connection, etc.). For example, a device such as achronaximeter may subscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published,shared, used by the device's manufacturer to inform of device updates,recalls, and the like. This information may be stored locally with themachine, and/or stored on an associated architecture, such as ahospital's central network, where the syndicated information may bereviewed by staff. The device may also publish a syndicated data feed.This data may include, but is not limited to, the performance of thedevice (e.g., consistency with established safety parameters), theamount of device usage, personnel using the device, patients with whomthe device was operated, and so forth.

Other physical medicine diagnostic and therapeutic devices that mayinteract with syndicated data in the above manner include, but are notlimited to a Electrode cable, Diagnostic electromyograph, Diagnosticelectromyograph needle electrode, Powered reflex hammer, Force-measuringplatform, Intermittent pressure measurement system, Miniature pressuretransducer, Diagnostic muscle stimulator, Isokinetic testing andevaluation system, Electric positioning chair, Rigid pneumatic structureorthosis, Powered wheeled stretcher, Powered communication system,Powered environmental control system, Powered table, Air-fluidized bed,Powered flotation therapy bed, Powered patient rotation bed, Moist steamcabinet, Microwave diathermy, Shortwave diathermy, Ultrasonic diathermy,Measuring exercise equipment, Powered exercise equipment, Powered fingerexerciser, Infrared lamp, Iontophoresis device, Powered external limboverload warning device, Powered inflatable tube massager, Therapeuticmassager, Powered heating pad, Pressure-applying device, Powered musclestimulator, Ultrasound and muscle stimulator, Power traction equipment,Powered heating unit, or a Therapeutic vibrator.

In embodiments, radiology diagnostic and therapeutic devices may be ableto interact with syndicated data, or publish one or more syndicatedfeeds may be able to interact with syndicated data, or publish one ormore syndicated feeds, or publish one or more syndicated feeds. Forexample, radiology diagnostic and therapeutic devices may be able topublish syndicated data, subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds,and store syndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used,received and/or stored locally with the device, and/or in associationwith a remote architecture (e.g., server, database, etc.) accessible tothe device (e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wireless connection,etc.). For example, a device such as a scintillation (gamma) camera maysubscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published, shared, used bythe device's manufacturer to inform of device updates, recalls, and thelike. This information may be stored locally with the machine, and/orstored on an associated architecture, such as a hospital's centralnetwork, where the syndicated information may be reviewed by staff. Thedevice may also publish a syndicated data feed. This data may include,but is not limited to, the performance of the device (e.g., consistencywith established safety parameters), the amount of device usage,personnel using the device, patients with whom the device was operated,and so forth.

Other radiology diagnostic and therapeutic devices that may interactwith syndicated data in the above manner include, but are not limited toa Magnetic resonance diagnostic device, Positron camera, Nuclear wholebody counter, Bone densitometer, Emission computed tomography system,Fluorescent scanner, Nuclear rectilinear scanner, Nuclear tomographysystem, Nuclear uptake probe, Nuclear whole body scanner, Nuclearscanning bed, Radionuclide dose calibrator, Radionuclide rebreathingsystem, Nuclear sealed calibration source, Nuclear electrocardiographsynchronizer, Nonfetal ultrasonic monitor, Ultrasonic pulsed dopplerimaging system, Ultrasonic pulsed echo imaging system, Diagnosticultrasonic transducer, Angiographic x-ray system, Diagnostic x-raybeam-limiting device, Cine or spot fluorographic x-ray camera,Electrostatic x-ray imaging system, Radiographic film marking system,Image-intensified fluoroscopic x-ray system, Non-image-intensifiedfluoroscopic x-ray system, Spot-film device, Stationary x-ray system,Diagnostic x-ray high voltage generator, Mammographic x-ray system,Mobile x-ray system, Photofluorographic x-ray system, Tomographic x-raysystem, Computed tomography x-ray system, Diagnostic x-ray tube housingassembly, Diagnostic x-ray tube mount, Pneumoencephalographic chair,Radiologic patient cradle, Radiographic film/cassette changer,Radiographic film/cassette changer programmer, Automatic radiographicfilm processor, Radiographic head holder, Radiologic quality assuranceinstrument, Radiographic ECG/respirator synchronizer, Radiologic table,Transilluminator for breast evaluation, Medical image storage device,Medical image communications device, Medical image digitizer, Medicalimage hardcopy device, Picture archiving and communications system,Medical charged-particle radiation therapy system, Medical neutronradiation therapy system, Manual radionuclide applicator system, Remotecontrolled radionuclide applicator system, Radiation therapybeam-shaping block, Radionuclide radiation therapy system, Poweredradiation therapy patient support assembly, Light beam patient positionindicator, Radiation therapy simulation system, and X-ray radiationtherapy system.

Administrative systems in a health care facility may be directed tothose functions within a health care setting that do not directlyinvolve patient care. Administrative systems may include systems such asa facility system, an environment system, a staffing system, acompliance system, a resource allocation system, an inventory system, ascheduling system, a financial system, and the like. In more detail,administrative systems may pertain to functions such as billing andaccounts payable, human resources, physical plant maintenance, supplyordering, nonclinical service provision (meals, housekeeping, etc.),transportation, scheduling, regulatory compliance, document managementand the like. For example, administrative systems may be used tocollect, share, use and/or store data for purposes such as, but notlimited to, compliance with facility rules, procedures, processes andregulations; providing a historical record for refuting malpracticeclaims; substantiating billing charges, and/or Medicaid/Medicare and/orinsurance claims; participating in or coordinating medical and/or healthcare related studies; ordering and filling prescriptions and/orlaboratory tests and/or procedures; and/or monitoring patient compliancewith medical and/or health related regimens and/or instructions. Datapertaining to, used by, collected by or generated by an administrativesystem may be termed administrative data.

In embodiments, hospital, facility, medical and healthcare related data,programs, applications, and systems may be able to interact withsyndicated data, or publish one or more syndicated feeds. For example,hospital, facility, medical and healthcare related programs,applications, processes, devices and/or systems may be able to publishsyndicated data, subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds, andstore syndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used,received and/or stored locally with the hospital, facility, medical andhealthcare related programs, applications, processes, devices and/orsystems, and/or in association with a remote architecture (e.g., server,database, etc.) accessible to the hospital, facility, medical andhealthcare related programs, applications, processes, devices and/orsystems (e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wireless connection,etc.). For example, a hospital, facility, medical and healthcare relatedprogram, application, process, device and/or system such as an emergencyroom triage evaluation program may subscribe to a syndicated data feedthat is published, shared, used by program's supplier, service provider,and/or administrator, to inform of program updates, recalls and thelike. This information may be stored locally with the program, and/orstored on an associated architecture, such as a hospital's,laboratory's, clinic's, medical office's, research facility's, and/orpharmacy's central network, where the syndicated information may bereviewed by staff. The program may also publish a syndicated data feed.This data may include, but is not limited to, the performance of theprogram (e.g., compliance with established medical procedures);coordination of the program with other systems such as administrativeprograms relating to staff schedules (e.g., schedules of doctors ofvarying specialties can be converted to a syndicated format andpublished, shared, used as a data feed as staff becomes available orunavailable) and/or sign-in procedures for staff employed to monitorpresence and/or availability; identification of personnel authorized touse the program; and/or tracking of patient data.

Other hospital, facility, medical and healthcare related data, programs,applications, and systems that may interact with syndicated data in theabove manner include, but are not limited to, allocation of clinicalprograms; allocation of facilities and staffing resources for operatingtheatres, hyperbaric chambers, birthing rooms, clean rooms and/or otherenvironmentally controlled resources; collection, evaluation and/orselection of research study subjects; compliance programs relating, butnot limited, to insurance, Medicaid/Medicare, infectious disease controlprocedures, HIPPA compliance.

In embodiments, administrative programs, procedures, processes andapplications may be able to interact with syndicated data, or publishone or more syndicated feeds. For example, administrative programs,procedures, processes and applications may be able to publish syndicateddata, subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds, and storesyndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used, receivedand/or stored locally with the program, procedure, process and/orapplication, and/or in association with a remote architecture (e.g.,server, database, etc.) accessible to the administrative programs,procedures, processes and applications (e.g., through the internet, WAN,LAN, wireless connection, etc.). For example, an administrative program,procedure, process and application such as a patient billing program maysubscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published, shared, used bythe program's manufacturer, service provider, and/or administrator, toinform of program updates, recalls and the like. This information may bestored locally with the program, and/or stored on an associatedarchitecture, such as a hospital's, laboratory's, clinic's, medicaloffice's, research facility's, and/or pharmacy's central network, wherethe syndicated information may be reviewed by staff. The program mayalso publish a syndicated data feed. This data may include, but is notlimited to, the data collected during the operation of the program, dataverifying the appropriate collection of data (i.e., performance) of theprogram (e.g., compliance with HIPPA regulations), the amount of programusage, personnel using the program, patients for whom the program iscollecting data and so forth.

Other administrative applications, programs, processes, devices,applications, databases and transaction processing systems that mayinteract with syndicated data in the above manner include, but are notlimited to, administrative programs relating to medical records;diagnoses; insurance authorization, capture of charges and/orreimbursement applications; Medicare/Medicaid compliance applications;research programs; systems, applications, programs and/or devices formonitoring patient compliance with medical or healthcare instructions;systems for monitoring dispensing of controlled substances, prescriptionhistory, new prescription writing; systems for monitoring usage ofsupplies and/or equipment for inventory control; and systems,applications, programs relating to on-call and personnel schedules, andstaffing.

In embodiments, systems, programs, applications, devices and processesrelating to physical plant, facilities and/or environmental conditionsmay be able to interact with syndicated data, or publish one or moresyndicated feeds. For example, systems, programs, applications, devicesand/or processes relating to physical plant, facilities and/orenvironmental conditions may be able to publish syndicated data,subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds, and store syndicateddata. This data may be published, shared, used, received and/or storedlocally with the system, program, application, device and/or processrelating to physical plant, facilities and/or environmental conditions,and/or in association with a remote architecture (e.g., server,database, etc.) accessible to the systems, programs, applications,devices and processes relating to physical plant, facilities and/orenvironmental conditions (e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wirelessconnection, etc.). For example, a system and/or device relating totemperature controls such as a thermostat may subscribe to a syndicateddata feed that is published, shared, used by system's and/or device'smanufacturer, service provider, and/or administrator, to inform ofsystem or device updates, recalls and the like. This information may bestored locally with the system and/or device, and/or stored on anassociated architecture, such as a hospital's, laboratory's, clinic's,medical office's, research facility's, and/or pharmacy's centralnetwork, where the syndicated information may be reviewed by staff. Thesystem and/or device may also publish a syndicated data feed. This datamay include, but is not limited to, the performance of the system and/ordevice (e.g., consistency with established safety parameters), theamount of system and/or device usage, personnel using the system and/ordevice, special conditions relating to the patients for whom the systemand/or device was operated and so forth.

Other systems, programs, applications, devices and processes relating tophysical plant, facilities and/or environmental conditions that mayinteract with syndicated data in the above manner include, but are notlimited to, clean rooms, electric light sensors, automatic door openers,camera security systems, public address systems, nursing or assistancecall buttons, phone systems, alarm systems, temperature sensors,humidistats, autoclaves, and/or air quality or ambient environmentsensors.

In embodiments, location devices and/or systems may be able to interactwith syndicated data, or publish one or more syndicated feeds. Forexample, location devices and/or systems may be able to publishsyndicated data, subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds, andstore syndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used,received and/or stored locally with the location device and/or system,and/or in association with a remote architecture (e.g., server,database, etc.) accessible to the location device and/or system (e.g.,through the internet, WAN, LAN, wireless connection, etc.). For example,a location device and/or system such as a patient location monitoringdevice may subscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published,shared, used by device's manufacturer, service provider, and/oradministrator, to inform of device updates, recalls and the like. Thisinformation may be stored locally with the device, and/or stored on anassociated architecture, such as a hospital's, nursing home's, clinic's,medical office's, and/or research facility's central network, where thesyndicated information may be reviewed by staff. The device may alsopublish a syndicated data feed. This data may include, but is notlimited to, the performance of the device (e.g., consistency withestablished safety parameters), the amount of device usage, personnelresponsible for monitoring the device, and/or patients with whom thedevice is operating and so forth.

Other location devices and/or systems that may interact with syndicateddata in the above manner include, but are not limited to, beepersystems, GPS enabled location devices and systems, equipment locationtracking devices, and/or anti-theft devices and/or systems.

In embodiments, measuring devices and/or apparatuses may be able tointeract with syndicated data, or publish one or more syndicated feeds.For example, measuring devices and/or apparatuses may be able to publishsyndicated data, subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds, andstore syndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used,received and/or stored locally with the measuring device and/orapparatus, and/or in association with a remote architecture (e.g.,server, database, etc.) accessible to the measuring device and/orapparatus (e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wireless connection,etc.). For example, a measuring device and/or apparatus such as a scalemay subscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published, shared, usedby the device's manufacturer to inform of device updates, recalls andthe like. This information may be stored locally with the device, and/orstored on an associated architecture, such as a hospital's,laboratory's, clinic's, medical office's, research facility's, and/orpharmacy's central network, where the syndicated information may bereviewed by staff. The device may also publish a syndicated data feed.This data may include, but is not limited to, the measurement taken(e.g., weight), a time stamp, the performance of the device or apparatus(e.g., consistency with established safety parameters), the amount ofdevice or apparatus usage, personnel using the device or apparatus,patients with whom the device or apparatus was operated and so forth.The data may be employed by an aggregator that maintains a patienthistory or by a treating physician who filters weight data to identifyrecords for patients of interest.

Other measuring devices and/or apparatuses that may interact withsyndicated data in the above manner include, but are not limited to,blood pressure cuffs; and/or thermometers.

In one embodiment, the treating physician may obtain a compilationincluding, but not limited to, a time stamped record of all quantitativedata, diagnoses, treatments, and so forth for a patient during ahospital visit through appropriate subscription and filtering of contentprovided by devices within the hospital. Other situations in which suchdata compilations might be used include, but not limited to,epidemiology surveys, and/or research programs.

In embodiments, pharmacy and/or laboratory systems, programs,applications, devices and/or processes may be able to interact withsyndicated data, or publish one or more syndicated feeds. For example,pharmacy and/or laboratory systems, programs, applications, apparatuses,devices and/or processes may be able to publish syndicated data,subscribe to and/or receive syndicated data feeds, and/or storesyndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used, receivedand/or stored locally with the pharmacy and/or laboratory systems,programs, applications, apparatuses, devices and processes, and/or inassociation with a remote architecture (e.g., server, database, etc.)accessible to the pharmacy and/or laboratory systems, programs,applications, devices and processes (e.g., through the internet, WAN,LAN, wireless connection, etc.). For example, a pharmacy and/orlaboratory system, program, application, apparatus, device and/orprocess such as a medication dispensing apparatus may subscribe to asyndicated data feed that is published, shared, used by the apparatus'smanufacturer and/or service provider to inform of apparatus updates,recalls and the like. This information may be stored locally with theapparatus, and/or stored on an associated architecture, such as ahospital's, laboratory's, clinic's, medical office's, researchfacility's, and/or pharmacy's central network, where the syndicatedinformation may be reviewed by staff. The apparatus may also publish asyndicated data feed. This data may include, but is not limited to, theperformance of the apparatus (e.g., verification of calibrations), theamount of apparatus usage, personnel using the apparatus, patients forwhose medications the apparatus was operated and so forth.

In another embodiment, prescription data may be published, shared, usedas new prescriptions are issued from doctors within a facility or to aremote facility. In a further embodiment, a patient-designated pharmacymay subscribe to prescription feeds and filter new prescriptions toidentify and prepare relevant prescriptions for customers.

Other pharmacy, medication dispensaries, and/or laboratory processes,programs, applications, apparatuses, and/or devices that may interactwith syndicated data in the above manner include, but are not limitedto, ordering lab tests or follow-up tests based on preliminary results;calibrating equipment; monitoring equipment status; record keeping;and/or providing information on medication recalls, alerts, and/orupdates on usage, side effects, and/or other information.

In embodiments, mobile devices and/or apparatuses may be able tointeract with syndicated data, or publish one or more syndicated feeds.For example, mobile devices and/or apparatuses may be able to publishsyndicated data, subscribe to and receive syndicated data feeds, andstore syndicated data. This data may be published, shared, used,received and/or stored locally with the mobile devices and/orapparatuses, and/or in association with a remote architecture (e.g.,server, database, etc.) accessible to the mobile devices and/orapparatuses (e.g., through the internet, WAN, LAN, wireless connection,etc.). For example, a mobile device and/or apparatus such as a blood gasmonitor may subscribe to a syndicated data feed that is published,shared, used by the monitor's manufacturer, service provider, and/ortechnician, to inform of monitor updates, recalls and the like. Thisinformation may be stored locally with the monitor, and/or stored on anassociated architecture, such as a hospital's, laboratory's, clinic's,medical office's, research facility's, and/or pharmacy's centralnetwork, where the syndicated information may be reviewed by staff. Themonitor may also publish a syndicated data feed. This data may include,but is not limited to, the performance of the monitor (e.g., consistencywith established safety parameters), the amount of monitor usage,personnel using the monitor, patients with whom the monitor was operatedand so forth.

Other mobile devices and/or apparatuses that may interact withsyndicated data in the above manner include, but are not limited to,X-ray machines, scooping devices, EEG devices, EKG devices, medicationdose delivery devices, blood flow monitors, oxygen meters and/orpulsometers.

In one aspect, a health care environment dashboard may be provided,including a user interface for locating, subscribing to, filtering, andotherwise processing feeds from any of the devices described above.Other devices, such as databases, billing systems, calendars, and thelike may also publish feeds that may be monitored using the health careenvironment dashboard. The dashboard may be user configurable, and mayprovide user tools for selecting, displaying, and manipulating variousfeeds within a hospital or other health care context.

Referring to FIG. 25, the device 2502 may be a diagnostic device,therapeutic device and/or administrative device, such as describedherein. The device 2502 may be associated with a healthcare environment,healthcare practice environment, research environment, medicalenvironment and/or another environment. The data and/or information,including syndicated data and/or information, may originate on a network110 or may originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202or directly. The device 2502 may publish or subscribe to a syndicateddata feed or stream, such as an RSS feed, web feed, RSS stream and/orRSS channel. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view and/or receiveinformation from and/or send information to and/or interact with thedevice 2502 directly or through an application/interface/other 1308. Theusers 1304 may also interact with each other. Theapplication/interface/other 1308 may be a client-side program, such asthe healthcare program discussed herein, a content management system, asocial networking application, a user interface, such as user interface700, 800 and/or 900, an application in connection with a media viewer, amedia viewer and/or an application providing for vertical marketintegration, such as described herein. The application/interface/other1308 may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 25may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

Referring to FIG. 26, the device 2502 may be a diagnostic device,therapeutic device and/or administrative device, such as describedherein. The device 2502 may be associated with a healthcare environment,healthcare practice environment, research environment, medicalenvironment and/or another environment. The data and/or information,including syndicated data and/or information, may originate on a network110 or may originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202or directly. The device 2502 may publish or subscribe to a syndicateddata feed or stream, such as an RSS feed, web feed, RSS stream and/orRSS channel. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view and/or receiveinformation from and/or send information to and/or interact with thedevice 2502 directly or through a database function 1402. The databasefunction 1402 may also interact directly with the syndicateddata/information 1302. The users 1304 may also interact with each other.The database function 1402 may be a database function as describedherein, such as related to data quality, data transformation, searching,filtering, clustering, a search engine, information relationships,hierarchical relationships and categorization, such as described herein.The database function 1402 may, for example, be deployed as a service ina services oriented architecture or using the other techniques describedabove with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrowsof FIG. 26 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

Referring to FIG. 27, the device 2502 may be a diagnostic device,therapeutic device and/or administrative device, as described herein.The device 2502 may be associated with a healthcare environment,healthcare practice environment, research environment, medicalenvironment and/or another environment. The data and/or information,including syndicated data and/or information, may originate on a network110 or may originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202or directly. The device 2502 may publish or subscribe to a syndicateddata feed or stream, such as an RSS feed, web feed, RSS stream and/orRSS channel. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view and/or receiveinformation from and/or send information to and/or interact with thedevice 2502 directly or through a semantic facility 1502. The semanticfacility 1502 may also interact directly with the device 2502. The users1304 may also interact with each other. The semantic facility 1502 mayprovide or be related to semantic rules, metadata creation, metadataenrichment, interpretation of aggregated data, such as syndicateddata/information 1302, translation of aggregated data, such assyndicated data/information 1302, creation of knowledge structures, adictionary and/or a thesaurus, such as described herein. The semanticfacility 1502 may, for example, be deployed as a service in a servicesoriented architecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 27may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

Referring to FIG. 28, the device 2502 may be a diagnostic device,therapeutic device and/or administrative device, as described herein.The device 2502 may be associated with a healthcare environment,healthcare practice environment, research environment, medicalenvironment and/or another environment. The data and/or information,including syndicated data and/or information, may originate on a network110 or may originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202or directly. The device 2502 may publish or subscribe to a syndicateddata feed or stream, such as an RSS feed, web feed, RSS stream and/orRSS channel. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users1304, such as users 404 and clients 102, may view and/or receiveinformation from and/or send information to and/or interact with thedevice 2502 directly or through a syndication facility 1602. Thesyndication facility 1602 may also interact directly with the device2502. The users 1304 may also interact with each other. The syndicationfacility 1602 may publish, subscribe to, aggregate and republishaggregated data, such as syndicated data/information 1302, such asdescribed herein. The syndication facility 1602 may also managesyndication information 1302, such as described herein. The syndicationfacility 1602 may, for example, be deployed as a service in a servicesoriented architecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 28may be data feeds, such as data feed 202. A user 1304 may also publish,republish and/or subscribe to a content source 204, data feed 202,aggregator 210 and/or syndication facility 1602.

Referring to FIG. 29, the device 2502 may be a diagnostic device,therapeutic device and/or administrative device. The device 2502 may beassociated with a healthcare environment, healthcare practiceenvironment, research environment, medical environment and/or anotherenvironment. The data and/or information, including syndicated dataand/or information, may originate on a network 110 or may originate froma content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. The device2502 may publish or subscribe to a syndicated data feed or stream, suchas an RSS feed, web feed, RSS stream and/or RSS channel. An aggregator210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such as users 404and clients 102, may view and/or receive information from and/or sendinformation to and/or interact with the device 2502 directly or throughan infrastructure 1702. The infrastructure 1702 may also interactdirectly with the device 2502. The users 1304 may also interact witheach other. The infrastructure 1702 may provide or be related tosecurity, authentication, traffic management, logging, pinging and/orcommunications, such as described herein. The infrastructure 1702 may,for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 29may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

Referring to FIG. 30, the device 2502 may be a diagnostic device,therapeutic device and/or administrative device, as described herein.The device 2502 may be associated with a healthcare environment,healthcare practice environment, research environment, medicalenvironment and/or another environment. The data and/or information,including syndicated data and/or information, may originate on a network110 or may originate from a content source 204 through a data feed 202or directly. The device 2502 may publish or subscribe to a syndicateddata feed or stream, such as an RSS feed, web feed, RSS stream and/orRSS channel. An aggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Theinfrastructure 1702 may also interact directly with the device 2502. Theusers 1304 may also interact with each other. The device 2502 may beassociated with special properties 1802. The special properties 1802 maybe related to formatting, display, identification, de-identification,transactions, restricted access and/or conditional access, such asdescribed herein. The special properties 1802 may also be associatedwith a service application 406, 408, 410, 412, 414 and/or 416. Incertain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 30 may be data feeds, such asdata feed 202.

A syndication platform including, e.g., RSS and/or OPML, along withsuitable enhancements for security and other enterprise class systemfeatures, may be used to manage health care information. Health caredata may be maintained in pools 1010, such as the pools described abovewith reference to FIG. 10, by entities in a health care system such ashospitals, individuals, health insurance providers, and/or academic orresearch facilities, and data from these pools 1010 may be selectivelyinterrelated using an outlining grammar such as OPML for specific viewsof the otherwise unstructured data. Conditional access may also besupported, and may provide for anonymous or personalized data dependingon the information requester. Any of the syndicated information and datadescribed herein may be an element in or source for one or more pools1010 and/or comprise a pool 1010.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelassociated with a healthcare pool 1010 may be associated with anaggregator 210 to track updates.

In embodiments, the RSS feed 202, web feed, RSS stream, or RSS channelassociated with a healthcare pool 1010 may be associated with a contentmanagement system that provides summaries of the syndicated dataavailable, dates associated with the syndicated data, links to accessthe full, non-summarized data, and the like. In one aspect, the contentmanagement system may be deployed using an enhanced syndication systemas described above.

In embodiments, the healthcare pools 1010 may be associated with anapplication 406 providing social networking, a user interface, a mediaviewer and/or vertical market integration.

Referring again to FIG. 13, the syndicated data/information 1302 may beone or more healthcare pools 1010 as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through anapplication/interface/other 1308. The users 1304 may also interact witheach other. The application/interface/other 1308 may be a client-sideprogram, such as the healthcare program discussed herein, a socialnetworking application, a user interface, such as user interface 700,800 and/or 900, an application in connection with a media viewer, amedia viewer and/or an application providing for vertical marketintegration, such as described herein. The application/interface/other1308 may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 13may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, the healthcare pools 1010 may be associated withdatabase functions that permit the data quality to be verified, providefor transformation of the data, enable searching, filtering, orclustering the patient data, or categorizing the data into hierarchies,interrelationships, interrelated groups, and the like.

Referring again to FIG. 14, the syndicated data/information 1302 may beone or more healthcare pools 1010 as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a databasefunction 1402. The database function 1402 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The database function 1402 may be a databasefunction as described herein, such as related to data quality, datatransformation, searching, filtering, clustering, a search engine,information relationships, hierarchical relationships andcategorization, such as described herein. The database function 1402may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 14may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare pools 1010 may be associated with semanticrules 412 that enable the creation of metadata. Semantic rules 412 mayalso provide for metadata enrichment of aggregated data, interpretationor translation of aggregated data, as well as permit the creation ofknowledge structures (e.g., using OPML) and the use of a dictionary,thesaurus or the like.

Referring again to FIG. 15, the syndicated data/information 1302 may beone or more healthcare pools 1010 as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a semanticfacility 1502. The semantic facility 1502 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The semantic facility 1502 may provide or berelated to semantic rules, metadata creation, metadata enrichment,interpretation of aggregated data, such as syndicated data/information1302, translation of aggregated data, such as syndicateddata/information 1302, creation of knowledge structures, a dictionaryand/or a thesaurus, such as described herein. The semantic facility 1502may, for example, be deployed as a service in a services orientedarchitecture or using the other techniques described above withreference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 15may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, users may publish and/or subscribe to and/or interactwith one or more healthcare pools 1010 to which others may subscribeand/or publish and/or with which others may interact.

In embodiments, healthcare pools 1010 may be further associated withinformation that may provide for the management of the data. Forexample, the aggregated data may list the author of the aggregated data,the date on which it was authored, etc. Thus, the data may provide forfurther aggregation, republication, and the like.

Referring to FIG. 16, the syndicated data/information 1302 may compriseone or more healthcare pools 1010 as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through a syndicationfacility 1602. The syndication facility 1602 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The syndication facility 1602 may publish,subscribe to, aggregate and republish aggregated data, such assyndicated data/information 1302, such as described herein. Thesyndication facility 1602 may also manage syndication information 1302,such as described herein. The syndication facility 1602 may, forexample, be deployed as a service in a services oriented architecture orusing the other techniques described above with reference to FIGS. 4 and5. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG. 16 may be data feeds, suchas data feed 202. A user 1304 may also publish, republish and/orsubscribe to a content source 204, data feed 202, aggregator 210 and/orsyndication facility 1602.

In embodiments, the healthcare pools 1010 may be provided within aninfrastructure 416 that provides for data security, authentication,management of the traffic created by the RSS feeds 202, web feeds, RSSstreams, or RSS channels, logging and pinging technology, and/or othercommunications.

Referring to FIG. 17, the syndicated data/information 1302 may be one ormore healthcare pools 1010 as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. Users 1304, such asusers 404 and clients 102, may view, receive, send and/or interact withthe syndicated data/information 1302 directly or through aninfrastructure 1702. The infrastructure 1702 may also interact directlywith the syndicated data/information 1302. The users 1304 may alsointeract with each other. The infrastructure 1702 may provide or berelated to security, authentication, traffic management, logging,pinging and/or communications, such as described herein. Theinfrastructure 1702 may, for example, be deployed as a service in aservices oriented architecture or using the other techniques describedabove with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. In certain embodiments the arrowsof FIG. 17 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, healthcare pools 1010 may be associated with specialformatting and/or display properties.

In embodiments, healthcare pools 1010 may be associated with specialidentification and/or de-identification properties.

In embodiments, healthcare pools 1010 may be associated with propertiesallowing for transactional processing. The transactions may be financialtransactions, such as related to medical reimbursement and/orsubscription fees or other charges for access to the syndicatedevidence-based information.

In embodiments, healthcare pools 1010 may be associated with restrictedor conditional access properties.

Referring to FIG. 18, the syndicated data/information 1302 may be one ormore healthcare pools 1010 as described herein. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may originate on a network 110 or may originatefrom a content source 204 through a data feed 202 or directly. Anaggregator 210 may be employed as described above. The infrastructure1702 may also interact directly with the syndicated data/information1302. The users 1304 may also interact with each other. The syndicateddata/information 1302 may be associated with special properties 1802.The special properties 1802 may be related to formatting, display,identification, de-identification, transactions, restricted accessand/or conditional access, such as described herein. The specialproperties 1802 may also be associated with a service application 406,408, 410, 412, 414 and/or 416. In certain embodiments the arrows of FIG.18 may be data feeds, such as data feed 202.

In embodiments, the one or more healthcare pools 1010 may be associatedwith a pool management infrastructure 1012 as described herein.

The systems and methods disclosed herein include systems and methods formanaging medical information. The systems and methods may involve:storing medical information in a syndication format; retrieving themedical information through a syndication collection facility; parsingthe information into personal and non-personal information; storing thepersonal information in a personal information data pool 1010; andstoring the non-personal information in a non-personal information pool1010.

The systems and methods disclosed herein include systems and methods forstoring medical information in a syndicated format. The systems andmethods may involve storing the medical information in an RSS format, anOPML format or other appropriate syndication format. In embodiments, themedical information is stored in two data pools 1010. Personalinformation relating to the medical information may be stored in one ofthe two data pools 1010. Non-personal information relating to themedical information is stored in the other of the two data pools 1010.

The systems and methods disclosed herein include systems and methods forstoring medical information in a syndicated format. In embodiments, themedical information comprises at least two parts. The at least two partsmay be categorized as personal information and non-personal information.The personal information relating to the medical information may bestored in one data pool 1010. The non-personal information relating tothe medical information may be stored in another data pool 1010. Theinformation residing in the two pools 1010 may have been related at onepoint in time, but were later separated and stored in separate pools1010 for various reasons. In embodiments, the information residing ineither pool 1010 or both pools 1010 may contain references,associations, pointers, tags, links, directors, and the like to theinformation contained in the other pool 1010. In embodiments, theinformation residing in the pool 1010 with personal information is theonly information of the two pools 1010 of information containingreferences, associations, pointers, tags, links, directors, and the liketo the information in the non-personal pool 1010 of data. Inembodiments, the information residing in the pool 1010 with non-personalinformation is the only information of the two pools 1010 containingreferences, associations, pointers, tags, links, directors, and the liketo the information in the personal pool 1010 of data.

The systems and methods disclosed herein include systems and methods formanaging medical information. The methods and systems may involvestoring medical information in a syndication format, wherein the medicalinformation has two parts. In embodiments, the two parts are personaland non-personal information. Records that require access to thepersonal information pool, such as a composite medical record for apatient, may be constructed from an OPML file or similar file thatincludes embedded access rights to specific data within the personalinformation pool. Thus, an OPML file or the like may be provided thatpersonalizes certain medical data, and identifies any data within theavailable pools that relates to, e.g., a specific patient. The OPML filemay be controlled by the patient using any suitable computer securityand/or physical security techniques, and the owner may grant transientaccess as need to medical care givers. Thus, there is in one aspectdisclosed herein a relational medical record that defines a patientmedical history by external reference to a plurality of data poolsincluding at least one secure pool and at least one insecure pool. Insuch a system, an array of data that would otherwise be confined toprivate medical records may be shared with the health care community foruse in research, evaluation, and so forth.

Embodiments of the present invention are related to the management ofpools 1010 and streams of information through syndication. Theinformation may relate to medical, healthcare, business, personal orother information syndicated for collection and/or analysis. Inembodiments, a secure pool 1010 of data may be formed and the securepool 1010 of data may have been produced through the collection ofsyndicated information. In embodiments, a pool 1010 of data with reducedsecurity relating to the secure pool 1010 of data may be generated. Inembodiments, the information residing in the secure pool 1010 and theinformation residing in the unsecured pool 1010, or reduced securitypool 1010, may be recombined through an association. The association maybe latent (e.g. residing in metadata) or explicit (e.g., residing in anexplicitly expressed relationship spanning, e.g., one or more OPMLfiles). In embodiments, the data in the secure pool 1010 may be havereferences, associations, pointers, tags, links, directors, and the liketo make the association with the data in the reduced security pool 1010to make the reconstruction. In embodiments, the data in the reducedsecurity pool 1010 may not have references, associations, pointers,tags, links, directors, and the like to make the recombination with thesecure data. Removing, or not permitting, an association may beimplemented as an additional security measure.

As generally described herein, health care data may be depersonalizedand published for general use using a syndication platform or other datapublication system. Personalization data may be maintained in aseparate, secure facility, and/or tracked through relationships definedusing, for example, an outline grammar such as OPML. In an embodiment,personal data (e.g., name, social security number, birth date, and/orany other data that may be used to identify an individual) may bemaintained in a conditional access system that provides various degreesand types of access for different users such as government authorities,medical professionals, individuals identified by the personal data, lawenforcement authorities, and so forth. Thus various degrees of access topersonalized and/or anonymous data may be supported and controlled. Inaddition, group data may be derived through a personalization enginethat provides limited access to personal data for purposes ofidentifying data for individuals within a demographic or other category.While a health care information system applying these principals is onepossible embodiment, and is described in greater detail herein, it willbe appreciated that the principles of this disclosure may be used with awide range of data sets and potential applications such as a financialdata, financial services data, consumer data, customer list data, and soforth.

Aspects of the present invention relate to storing healthcareinformation in separate pools 1010 of data wherein the separate pools1010 store information relating to personal and non-personalinformation. In embodiments, the personal and non-personal informationis stored with an association between them (e.g. directly or through arelation in a relational database). In embodiments, there is no relationbetween the personal and non-personal information. In embodiments, thepersonal and non-personal information may have been related at one pointin time and then later separated into unrelated information or relatedin such a way that either the personal or non-personal information maybe accessed separately or in a combined fashion. In embodiments, thereis an association between the information in the related pools 1010. Inembodiments, there is an association that is only made by usinginformation residing in one of the pools 1010. The relationships (orlack thereof) may be managed independently from the data using, forexample, an outlining grammar such as OPML.

FIG. 31 illustrates a healthcare information platform E100. Healthcareplatform E100 may be used to facilitate the generation of healthcarereports E114. The reports E114 may be generated as a result ofcollecting syndicated information from healthcare related sources E118.In this illustration, there are several sources of healthcare or medicalinformation E118. The healthcare information sources E118 may producedata in a syndicated format (e.g. RSS, OPML, XML, etc.). The informationsources may be medical instruments E118A, x-ray equipment E118B, MRIequipment E118C, CAT scan equipment, other forms of medical imagingequipment, blood work data E118D, genetic information, medical examinformation E118E, physician's notes, pharmaceutical or prescriptionrecords, patient diagnosis records, patient treatment records, patientcondition records, medical device information E118F, information fromemergency rooms E118G, information from medical labs E118H, dietinformation, exercise information, metabolic information, medicalhistory information, age information, gender information, behaviorinformation, race information, or information from other systems relatedto the healthcare and/or medical field. The information from the sourcesof information E118A may be disparate information or the information maybe related in some way. For example, the information produced from eachof the sources E118 may relate to the same person but the informationmay be collected through facilities throughout a geographic region. Apatient may go to his doctor for a medical exam and the doctor mayproduce information pertaining to the exam in a syndicated format so itcan be collected by a syndication collection facility later. The patientmay also go to a hospital located in a town separate from thephysician's office where the medical exam was conducted, the patient mayhave an MRI or other test performed. Again, the information produced bythe tests could be produced in a syndicated format to be latercollected. The patients primary care physician may, for example, go to asyndication collection facility E108 and collect all of such informationproduced relating to the patient as a way of collecting all of theinformation in one place. The syndicated information may be timestamped, or the like, such that only newly produced medical informationis collected and stored. The doctor may then run reports (e.g. patientreport E114F) on the collected information to assemble a clear historyof the patient. Information from the several sources may also beprocessed through an algorithm facility E112 to further refine theinformation, correlate the information internally or with externalinformation, produce segmented reporting based on the primary issues athand (e.g. has the patient had any adverse reactions to medicines).

The information produced by the several medical information sources E118may be accessible through the Internet E102 or other network. Asyndication collection facility 108 such as a spider or syndicatedcontent search engine may operate in association with a computerfacility E110. The syndication collection facility E108 may be directedto collect all information relating to a particular subject (e.g. apatient and patient medical records, trend information, diseaseinformation within a geographic region, etc.). Syndication collectionfacilities are described in more detail herein as well as in thereference material incorporated by reference herein. The informationcollected through the syndication collection facility E108 may beprocessed through an algorithm facility E112. The algorithm facilityE112 may be adapted to run any type of algorithm designed to manipulateand/or interact with data collected by the syndication collectionfacility E108. The algorithm facility may also be adapted to producereports E114, and the like, and the reports E114 may be displayed on thecomputer facility E110. The computer facility may be any computerprocessing equipment such as a desktop computer, laptop computer,notebook computer, palmtop computer, wireless computer, wired computer,PDA, mobile communication facility, cell phone, phone, or other systemadapted to perform such processes.

Reports E114 may pertain to an individual, a population, region,disease, health risk, virus, or other entity or health or medicalinformation. A syndication collection facility E108 may be adapted tocollect all of the information pertaining to a particular health relatedconcern for example. For example, the concern may relate to encephalitiswithin the coastal communities of Massachusetts and the syndicationcollection facility may be adapted to collect any and all informationrelating to encephalitis within that geographic area, or outside thatgeographic area, collected from healthcare information systems E118.Three patients in the area may have been recently physically examinedand blood work may have been completed. The exams and blood results mayindicate they have contracted the disease. The collection facility E118may collect this information and the algorithm facility E112 maymanipulate the information, along with other related information (e.g.climate conditions in the area, weather expected in the area, mosquitoactivities, mosquito extermination activities, etc.) to produce reportsE114, predictions, estimates, historical trends and the like. Examplesof reports produced through the collection of syndicated health and/ormedical information are regional epidemiological reports E114A andE114B, medical trends E114C, medical device trends E114D, medicalinstrument trends E114E, patient reports E114F and the like.

An aspect of the present invention relates to the syndication of medicalinformation and the collection of the syndicated information for thegeneration of reports and the like. Another aspect of the presentinvention relates to producing information in a way that protects theprivacy of individuals while providing broad access to information thatmay be used to identify trends, histories, predictions, as well as forother uses. Referring to FIG. 32, a medical information platform usingpooled information E200 is illustrated. The medical information platformusing pooled information may be described as a system designed toproduce pooled information wherein a plurality of pools 1010 may beproduced, one pool 1010 containing personal information E230 (e.g.patient name, social security number, insurance information) and onepool 1010 containing non-personal information E238 (e.g. medicalinformation such as examination results disassociated with a patient'spersonal information).

The medical information systems E202 may produce syndicated medicalinformation that is stored in an associated database E124. The producingfacility E202 and its associated database E124 may also be associatedwith a server E122 to aid in the collection of the syndicatedinformation they produce. The server E122 may be associated with theinternet or other network E102. A syndication collection facility may beadapted, with a spider E218 for example, for collecting the syndicatedinformation from the plurality of databases E124. An aggregationfacility E220 may also be in use to aggregate the information collectedby the spider E218 and the aggregated information may be parsed througha parsing facility E214. The processes used in the collection andmanipulation of the syndicated medical information may be operating inassociation with syndication collection security facility E212 to ensureprivacy and transactional security.

The information that is parsed by the parsing facility E214 may becollected into two or more pools 1010 of information for example. Onepool 1010 may contain parsed personal data E230 relating to thesyndicated information collected by the spider E218 and the other pool1010 may contain non-personal information E238 (e.g. exam results,medical history). The pools 1010 of information may be used for avariety of reasons. For example, the pool 1010 containing medicalnon-personal information E238 may be used by epidemiologists or otherhealthcare professionals to gather information related to trends or thelike without sacrificing privacy of patients or having to rely onobtaining information releases from the many people to whom theinformation pertains. The information pool 1010 containing the personalinformation relating to the medical information E230 may be used,through a security facility E232, by itself or to be re-associated withthe medical information residing in the medical information pool 1010E238 to generate patient specific reports and the like.

In another embodiment, some or all of the health care data may bede-personalized and syndicated using the systems described herein.Information needed to personalize data, i.e., associate the data with aparticular patient or group of patients, may be retained at a differentlocation, such as a secure data repository. In one embodiment,personalization information may be maintained in an outline such as anOPML document. Similarly, OPML or the secure data repository may beemployed to sort data with partial personalization, such as to obtaindemographic data or the like. For example, a personalization facilitymay be employed to gather all data for individuals having certainobjective characteristics, such as a specified age, weight, gender,medical condition, or the like, without identifying any of the specificindividuals for whom data is being provided.

The information provided by the medical information sources E202, whichmay be, for example, any of the medical devices described above, may beformatted in a syndication format, such as RSS or OPML. The spider E218may look for and gather the syndicated information as a result of atargeted syndication search. The parser may parse the information in anumber of ways. For example, if the syndicated information is providedin an OPML format, the parser may extract information relating to themedical condition, diagnosis, testing, prognosis, symptoms, testresults, images and the like to be sent to the pooled medicalinformation E238, while personal information may be extracted and sentto the personal information pool 1010. The personal information maystill retain tags or outline parameters that may be used to reconnectthe personal information to the non-personal medical information in thepooled medical information E238.

FIG. 33 illustrates another method of pooling medical data E200 toretain privacy and security. Method E200 relates in part to storing theinformation in two separate, but referenced pools 1010 of data. Forexample, the medical device E202C may store information in a relateddatabase E124C in separate but related sections in the database. Theinformation may be stored using a syndicated format such that a spideror other syndication collection facility could be used to collect themedical information. In embodiments, the personal and non-personalinformation is stored in a relational database with syndication tags andthe relational database may be open to certain syndication collectionactivities. With the information stored in two pools 1010, one relatingto personal information and one relating to non-personal information, aspider may be directed to collect the non-personal information E304through server E122C. Information from several like sources, or severalrecords from the medical device E202C, may be aggregated E220 and parsedE214 if desired. In addition, the personal information E302 may becollected, aggregated, from several like sources, or several recordsfrom the medical device E202C, and parsed if desired. A collection ofaggregated and/or parsed personal data and aggregated and/or parsednon-personal medical information may be stored in separate pools 1010E230 and E238. In another embodiment, personalizing data may not bestored within the system, but may be maintained separately by datausers. Thus for example, an individual may maintain a list of referencesto all diagnosis, treatment, and other health care information for theindividual within the pools 1010 of data. This list may be preservedwithin a separate, secure facility with encryption techniques employedfor authenticity and non-repudiation of references to actual recordspertaining to the individual within the pool 1010(s).

Continuing to refer to FIG. 33, the information pool 1010 containing thepersonal information relating to the medical information E230 may beused, through a security facility E232, to be re-associated with themedical information residing in the medical information pool E238 togenerate patient specific reports and the like. This approach may beemployed to review or analyze medical information relating to one ormore people through a computer facility E234A. It may be appropriate incertain circumstances to obtain consent from In embodiments, access topooled medical information E238 may be the only information provided andit may be accessed through computer facility E234B. Computer E234B mayalso be associated with a security facility (not shown). In otherembodiments, personal information may be correlated to data within theinformation pools 1010 using, e.g., an outline grammar such as OPML. Apatient record OPML file may be separately and securely maintained. Inone embodiment, only an authorized medical professional may have accessto the patient record OPML file. In another embodiment, an owner of thedata (i.e., the person to whom the data relates) may have read-onlyaccess to the OPML file.

Aspects of the present invention relate to pooling syndicatedinformation. Pools 1010 may contain information relating to informationthat was found in data streams. The information may have been found inthe data stream at particular times or in particular places. Forexample, a financial market may produce a stream of data relating totrades made during a trading session and a pool 1010 of data extractedfrom the stream may be produced to be accessed later. As anotherexample, medical information may be produced by a medical device and themedical device information may be pushed into a data stream. The medicalinformation from the data stream may be extracted from the stream andloaded into a pool 1010.

Pools 1010 of data can be merged with other pools 1010 of data to formlarger pools 1010 (e.g. to combine things of like file type, semanticmeaning, etc.). In embodiments, pools 1010 may be drained, and in doingso new data streams may be created. For example, streaming a series ofoffers to sell goods (or services, securities, etc.) at a given price,out of a pool 1010 of such offers. In embodiments, the data stream maybe buffered until relevant decision points are achieved.

In embodiments, a filter may be associated with a pool 1010 of data. Apool 1010 of data may be created from unfiltered data (e.g. anunfiltered data stream), then over time the pool 1010 can be run throughfilters to produce a cleaner/more relevant pool 1010 of data. The filtercould be a semantic filter, a collaborative filter, a logical filter, ora human filter (such as a community that validates the presence ofcontent in the pool 1010). E.g., a pool 1010 could contain “good movies”that are monitored by a community.

In embodiments, pools 1010 may be linked to other pools 1010, so thatone pool 1010 spills into the other (e.g., a pool 1010 of data thattakes input from another pool 1010 upon occurrence of an event, such asavailability of a resource for processing (e.g., a resource becomesavailable to process an incoming message requesting help from a softwarehelp desk and is handed into a pool 1010 of similar requests forhandling by someone who is responsible for that type of request)). Pools1010 of data can evaporate (that is, data items can be made to expirefrom the pool 1010, either based on age, or based on the rightconditions (e.g., if a price of a security drops low enough, then limitorders may be triggered; if time passes, an option can expire, etc.).Pools 1010 may be filled by different sources (a main source, as well assecondary sources or streams that augment the main source streams).

An aspect of the present invention relates to using syndicated heathrelated data and health related syndicated data pools 1010. Thefollowing embodiments, illustrate a few of the envisioned uses of suchinformation.

In embodiments, community-based health data may be communicated tohealthcare professionals, the public or other persons or entitiesthrough syndication feeds associated with the community-based healthdata. The syndication feeds may consist of syndicated health datacollected by community health clinics, emergency personnel, hospitals,hospices, nursing homes, public health screening sites, mobile screeningfacilities, community health drives, blood drives, school clinics,emergency rooms, physician offices, and/or other sites where health datamay be collected. Community-based health data includes, but is notlimited to, cases of disease, such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes,stroke, mortality, serious accidents, child immunizations, influenza,and so forth. This information may be linked with other demographicdata, such as age, sex, race, social security number, religion, areacode, home address, work address, billing address, credit cardinformation, family information, birthplace, driver's license number,employer, position, and income bracket. Community-based health data maybe communicated through syndication feeds continuously, at setintervals, at predetermined intervals, upon an event or updatedinformation, or at another appropriate time.

In embodiments, community-based health data may be communicated througha syndicated feed based on syndicated heath data stored in a centralizedfacility or in several data repositories. The storage and associateddata analysis may occur within a community public health clinic, statepublic health clinic, university research facility, medical school,and/or national public health entity such as the National Institutes ofHealth or the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Such a systemof reporting may permit macro and micro temporal tracking of healthtrends.

In embodiments, syndication feeds relating to community health statusdata may be randomly sampled to calculate public health indicators. Forexample, a county public health agency may receive a plurality ofsyndication feeds containing community health data. The agency may havea need to know about the most prevalent health ailments found amongchildren living in the county. Rather than analyze all the health dataavailable about children, it may be advantageous financially andempirically to randomly sample from the available health data. This mayreduce the analytic task by lessening the data required for analysis aswell as improve the validity of the analysis by permitting the agency toensure that the data used for analysis adequately represents thecommunity as a whole (i.e., minimizes bias). Furthermore, the healthdata may be used by the agency for other public health study formats.For example, community health data communicated through syndicated feedsmay be used to compute disease incidence, disease prevalence, identifynew outbreaks of disease and/or infection, calculate the distribution ofdisease across demographic variables, and/or identify populations thatare vulnerable to future health concerns.

In embodiments syndicated feeds related to community-based health statusdata may be linked to location information, such as Global PositioningSystem (GPS) data or information relating to a home address or clinicaddress. This coupling of health and geographic data may permit analysisof environmental factors that may be affecting the health of thecommunity. For example, by linking the rates of obesity with thegeographic location of the green spaces it may be possible to inferwhether there is a relationship between increasing rates of obesity andaccess to parks and other recreational areas. Similarly, environmentaldata on particulate matter released by local industries may be linkedwith the location of recent lung cancer cases to assist in determiningthe influence of air pollution on cancer incidence.

In embodiments, syndicated data on community health may be presented foruse by health care providers through syndication feeds and the like. Forexample, healthcare facilities, such as hospitals, may be in need ofinformation on the rates of disease and the distribution of health needswithin the population residing in the facility's catchment area. Forexample, when planning its fiscal budget, a county hospital may be inneed of information to assist it in allocating resources between kidneydialysis services and diabetes treatment. The community health data,discoverable through a syndicated feed, may indicate declining rates ofkidney disease and increasing rates of diabetes, thereby increasing theconfidence the hospital administrators may have in choosing to divertresources to increase funding for diabetes treatment.

In embodiments, health education materials may be made available to thepublic through syndication feeds that are sent in accordance with healthdata retrieved during community health screenings. For example, during acommunity health screening patients may have their blood glucose levelschecked. For those patients with abnormal glucose levels, a syndicationdata feed regarding proper blood sugar management may be set up forreview and/or printing by the patient. Additional systems could recordwhich patients receive these educational materials to permit futureanalyses of the effectiveness of the educational materials in helpingpatients manage their health. For example, when such data is viewed, newsyndicated data may be developed and sent back to an available pool 1010of such data. An association may be made between the data indicating thematerial was received and past and/or future health care relatedinformation.

In embodiments, data regarding the clinical practices of healthcareproviders and institutions may be stored in a syndicated format. Just asthe medical chart currently follows the patient throughout his treatmentwithin an institution, so too could a data feed adapted to capture suchinformation from a pool 1010 of such syndicated information. A devicecould syndicate salient information at each step of the treatmentprocess, from intake to discharge, to follow-up consultations. Forexample, upon intake, a patient's demographic information may becollected, such as age, sex, race, social security number, religion,area code, home address, work address, billing address, credit cardinformation, family information, birthplace, driver's license number,employer, position, and income bracket and the information may besyndicated (e.g. tagged to be later retrieved through a syndicationfeed). Throughout the patient's interaction with the healthcareprovider(s) additional information may be collected and syndicated to belater collected through syndication feeds. This information may include,but is not limited to, admission time, time of first consultation,health status/diagnosis on intake (e.g., ICD-10 code), the patient'scurrently prescribed medications, timing of treatment(s), treatmentdosages, duration of treatment, symptoms, change in symptoms (healthstatus), self-assessed health status/quality of life, time of discharge,and morbidity/mortality outcomes.

In embodiments, data collected about the clinical practices ofhealthcare providers and institutions communicated through syndicationfeeds may be stored and analyzed as part of a continuous qualityimprovement regime to ascertain efficiency. It is necessary forhealthcare providers to provide treatment to patients in an efficientmanner that optimizes the patient's health while minimizinginstitutional waste. Information is required to monitor the efficiencyof any institution and this is especially important within the field ofhealthcare due to the many different services and service providers thatimpact institutional efficiency. Just as the medical chart currentlyfollows the patient throughout his treatment within an institution, sotoo could a syndication by collecting all relevant information from apool 1010 of syndicated data. A device could record salient informationat each step of the treatment process, from intake to discharge, tofollow-up consultations. Once this information was sent to a storagefacility, it may be made available for administrators or researchers foranalysis of whether services were efficiently provided to patients.Information that may be used in this manner may include, but is notlimited to, admission time, time of first consultation, healthstatus/diagnosis on intake (e.g., ICD-10 code), the patient's currentlyprescribed medications, timing of treatment(s), treatment dosages,duration of treatment, time of discharge, and timing of follow-upconsultations.

In embodiments, data collected about the clinical practices ofhealthcare providers and institutions communicated through syndicationfeeds may be stored and analyzed as part of a continuous qualityimprovement regime to ascertain effectiveness.

In embodiments, data collected about the clinical practices ofhealthcare providers and institutions communicated through syndicationfeeds may be stored and analyzed as part of a continuous qualityimprovement regime to ascertain the cost effectiveness of services. Theclinical data collected from individual patients may be collected,syndicated, and stored. It may then be monitored in conjunction with ahealthcare provider's financial information to determine thecost-effectiveness of the treatment's administered. These results maythen be compared to national norms for the purposes of benchmarkingindividual healthcare providers or institutions.

In embodiments, data collected about the clinical practices ofhealthcare providers and institutions communicated through syndicationfeeds may be stored and analyzed as part of a program to ensureconformance with accepted standards of care. For many clinicalconditions there are published standards of care to guide physicians andother healthcare personnel in proper medical decision making. Forexample, blood pressure is considered to be “high” typically if apatient(s) systolic pressure is over 120 and/or diastolic pressureexceeds 80. Thus, a basic standard of care provides that a patient witha blood pressure reading exceeding these levels should be treated forhypertension. However, there are many additional factors that must beconsidered before the healthcare provider can make the appropriatetreatment recommendation. For instance, the age of the patient, thepatient's current medications, the patient's concurrent morbidities, andmany other factors influence the decision to treat the hypertensionthrough dietary change, exercise, medication, or some combination ofthese. A healthcare provider's effectiveness, and the effectiveness ofthe institution within which she serves patients, may be determined inpart by the degree to which treatment conforms to these standards ofcare. By using syndicated data to continuously record information aboutthe patient's treatment, this information may be accessed in real-time,or retrospectively, and analyzed to determine conformance with acceptedstandards of care.

In embodiments, a syndicated feed relating to data about a patient'scourse of treatment could trigger alerts to physicians and otherhealthcare providers when the treatment regimen diverges from theaccepted standard of care. For example, such information may be used torecord a patient's current medications upon intake to a hospital or themedications may be determined through a related syndicated feed. Duringthe course of treatment at the hospital, additional data may be added toa pool 1010 of syndicated information, including new medications thatmay be administered. Should there be a new medication that is prescribedthat has a known negative interaction with a mediation that the patientwas currently taking, but for whatever reason was not recognized by thehealthcare provider, an alert could be forwarded by syndicated feed to aphysician's device alerting the physician of the potential problem. Thealgorithms used to determine diversions from accepted clinical standardsof care may be stored on a central server, or locally on a client, forexample, and act as filters or predictors based on the incomingsyndication data relating to the patients' records. Furthermore, thealgorithms may be updated to reflect findings from new clinical researchand changing standards of care.

In embodiments, syndication feeds may be prospectively used to assistmedical decision making. As described herein, throughout a patient'sclinical treatment, data may be collected, including admission time,time of first consultation, health status/diagnosis on intake (e.g.,ICD-10 code), the patient's currently prescribed medications, timing oftreatment(s), treatment dosages, duration of treatment, symptoms, changein symptoms (health status), self-assessed health status/quality oflife, time of discharge, and morbidity/mortality outcomes. A healthcareprovider may store algorithms on a server reflecting the clinicalstandards of care for the types of patients treated by that healthcareprovider. As data are collected throughout the patient's treatment, theincoming syndication feed may be filtered or otherwise associated withthese algorithms and used to derive recommendations that may, in turn,be forward to healthcare providers for consultation during the clinicaldecision making process. For example, medical researchers employed by ahospital may learn through a recent medical journal article that aparticular dosage of statins was found to reduce subsequent heartattacks in patients receiving coronary artery bypass surgery. Theresearchers may manifest this new knowledge in the form of an algorithmthat filters or otherwise manipulates all incoming patient syndicationdata feeds looking for patients that have received bypass surgery, andthen determining the current dosage of statins that each patient iscurrently taking. Bypass surgery patients that are not taking statins,or that are not taking the correct dosage (i.e., is not conforming tothe accepted standard of care), may be identified and an alert forwardedto a healthcare provider by RSS feed to let the provider know that thereis a high probability that this patient should have her statin dosageadjusted. Furthermore, the algorithms may be continuously updated toreflect findings from new clinical research and changing standards ofcare.

In embodiments, syndication data streams may be used to optimizeenrollment in clinical trials. One of the challenges and significantcosts incurred by clinical trials is identifying patients who areappropriate for study. Often there are extensive lists of inclusioncriteria based on demographic, health status, and other indicators thatare used to determine which patients are appropriate for enrollment. Inaddition, may clinical trials have complicated, stratified trial designsand subject pools 1010 that are enrolled across a geographically diversepopulation requiring extensive coordination to ensure that onlyappropriate subjects are enrolled and that no class of subjects isover-, or under-enrolled. By using a syndication feed of patients'information, all indicators that are relevant to the inclusion criteriaof a given clinical trial may be continuously monitored. This process ofreview may be centralized or may occur within each healthcare providerpoint of patient contact, for example. For example, upon intake, apatient's demographic information may be collected, such as age, sex,race, social security number, religion, area code, home address, workaddress, billing address, credit card information, family information,birthplace, driver's license number, employer, position, and incomebracket. Throughout the patient's interaction with the healthcareprovider(s) additional information may be collected and sent viasyndication feeds. This information may include, but is not limited to,admission time, time of first consultation, health status/diagnosis onintake (e.g., ICD-10 code), the patient's currently prescribedmedications, timing of treatment(s), treatment dosages, duration oftreatment, symptoms, change in symptoms (health status), self-assessedhealth status/quality of life, time of discharge, andmorbidity/mortality outcomes. A clinical trial's inclusion criteriacould manifest as an algorithm on a central server against which theindividual patients' syndicated feed data are compared forcompatibility. When there is a match (i.e., a patient qualifies forenrollment in a study) an alert may be forwarded to an attendingphysician or other healthcare provider, along with information about thestudy, its purpose, and requirements of patients. Additionally, informedconsent forms and other relevant enrollment materials may also beforward via syndication. Following enrollment, a duplicate “blinded”(i.e., no personal identifiers other than study ID) patient record maybe forwarded by syndication to a separate clinical trial datarepository.

In embodiments, syndication data streams of patient's data may be usedto enroll patients in clinical trials by randomizing patients accordingto the analytic design of the clinical study. For example, clinicalcohort studies may have a stratified design in which a predeterminednumber of patients from different age strata are sought for enrollment.By analyzing the demographic data included in the patient feeds, it maybe possible to more efficiently stratify enrollment, while stillmaintaining randomization. Similarly, stratification could be carriedout based upon clinical criteria, such as disease status/severity.Case-control studies, observational study, and/or trend analyses may beconducted in a similar manner.

In embodiments, syndicated data feeds may be used by patients tocommunicate health status data to their health care providers from home.Using a device capable of capturing and syndicating data, patients mayrecord their symptoms in real-time, along with relevant healthindicators (e.g., glucose levels, respiratory volume, etc.) and make thedata available to their physician through an associated feed. Similarly,patients could record information relating to the timing of takingmedications, their functional status, and so forth. Temporal comparisonsmay be made to determine the presence of any clinically relevant changesin a patient's health status. Clinically relevant changes in a patient'shealth status may be used to automatically generate an email to ahealthcare provider alerting them to the change. If appropriate, anappointment may be scheduled.

In embodiments, a syndication feed may be used to alert patients to anupcoming appointment with a healthcare provider.

In embodiments, syndication feeds may be used to push medical contentand information to patients based upon their medical condition(s). Forexample, a healthcare provider may be able to initiate an RSS feed forpatients based upon clinical information, such as a patient's ICD-10code. This may be used as a filter to screen information repositories(e.g., medical journal databases such as Medline) for information thatis relevant to a patient. Similarly, breaking news from news wireservices, such as Reuters, may also be screened for its relevance to apatient's health condition(s). Once aggregated, this information may bepresented through a feed for review by patients.

In embodiments, syndication feeds may be based upon data collected fromenvironmental toxin sensors. For example, public health departments mayemploy a variety of environmental sensors to monitor water, air, andsoil pollutants, as well as toxic spills or other sudden changes inenvironmental status. This data may be stored in syndicated data pools1010 and retrieved in real-time via syndication feeds for continuousmonitoring. The data may be analyzed for trends and changes over time.The data may be merged with other community data (e.g., citizens' healthstatus, location data, GPS data, etc.) to determine causal patternsand/or disease clustering. Similarly, environmental monitoring could becarried out within a single home and used to monitor radon levels,mildew/mold, lead dust, soil toxins, water toxins, etc. This informationmay be communicated through syndication to a homeowner's computer, PDA,or any other device capable of receiving such feeds.

While the invention has been disclosed in connection with certainpreferred embodiments, other embodiments will be recognized by those ofordinary skill in the art, and all such variations, modifications, andsubstitutions are intended to fall within the scope of this disclosure.Thus, the inventions disclosed herein are to be understood with respectto the following claims, which should be interpreted in the broadestsense allowable by law.

What is claimed is:
 1. A computer implemented method comprising:generating a data pool to receive and publish data that includesultrasound echo data, wherein generating the data pool is performed by amicroprocessor of the computer executing instructions stored in anon-transitory computer memory and comprises: receiving ultrasound echodata from one or more medical devices; securing the ultrasound echo datawith a conditional access mechanism to provide a secure item; addingmetadata to the secure item that includes metadata identifyingcharacteristics of a patient; publishing the secure item and themetadata in a syndicated data feed using the microprocessor of acomputer executing instructions stored in a non-transitory computermemory; subscribing to the syndicated data feed; storing the syndicateddata feed in the data pool, wherein the format of the syndicated datafeed is selected from the group consisting of: Really SimpleSyndication, Resource Description Framework Site Summary, Rich SiteSummary and Outline Processor Markup Language; extracting data relatedto an abnormality of the ultrasound echo data from the syndicated datafeed; comparing the extracted data related to the abnormality withcomparable ultrasound echo data from a normal specimen; extracting datarelated to adverse patient outcomes from the syndicated data feed; andcorrelating adverse patient outcomes with the abnormality of theultrasound echo data.
 2. The computer implemented method of claim 1further comprising accessing the data pool to obtain data forauthorizing a medical procedure.
 3. The computer implemented method ofclaim 1 further comprising accessing the data pool to obtain data forauthorizing payment for a medical procedure.
 4. The computer implementedmethod of claim 1 further comprising limiting access to the secure itembased upon a privacy rule.
 5. The computer implemented method of claim 1further comprising limiting access to the secure item based upon anidentity of a requester of the secure item.
 6. The computer implementedmethod of claim 1, further comprising adding metadata to the secure itemthat includes at least one item of metadata selected from the groupconsisting of metadata identifying the medical device, metadataidentifying a time of creation of the ultrasound echo data, metadataidentifying a physician who requested the ultrasound echo data, metadataidentifying the patient, metadata identifying an intended recipient ofthe ultrasound echo data, and metadata identifying a laboratory wherethe medical device is located.
 7. The computer implemented method ofclaim 1 wherein the metadata identifies the medical device.
 8. Thecomputer implemented method of claim 1 wherein the metadata identifies atime of creation of the ultrasound echo data.
 9. The computerimplemented method of claim 1 wherein the metadata identifies aphysician who requested the ultrasound echo data.
 10. A computerimplemented method comprising: generating a data pool to receive andpublish data that includes ultrasound echo data, wherein generating thedata pool is performed by a microprocessor of the computer executinginstructions stored in a non-transitory computer memory and comprises:receiving ultrasound echo data from a plurality of medical devices;securing the ultrasound echo data with a conditional access mechanism toprovide a secure item; adding metadata to the secure item that includesmetadata identifying characteristics of a patient; publishing the secureitem and the metadata in syndicated data feeds using the microprocessorof the computer executing instructions stored in a non-transitorycomputer memory; subscribing to the syndicated data feeds; storing thesyndicated data feeds in the data pool, wherein the format of thesyndicated data feeds is selected from the group consisting of: ReallySimple Syndication, Resource Description Framework Site Summary, RichSite Summary and Outline Processor Markup Language; extractinginformation relating to an abnormality in the ultrasound echo data fromthe syndicated data feeds; comparing the extracted data related to theabnormality in the ultrasound echo data with comparable ultrasound echodata from a normal specimen; extracting information relating to atreatment of the patient and characteristics of the patient from thesyndicated data feeds; and correlating the information relating to thenormality of the ultrasound echo data with the information related tothe treatment data.
 11. The computer implemented method of claim 1wherein the metadata identifies an intended recipient of the ultrasoundecho data.
 12. The computer implemented method of claim 1 wherein themetadata identifies a laboratory where the medical device is located.13. The computer implemented method of claim 1 further comprisingmanually entering the metadata.
 14. The computer implemented method ofclaim 1 wherein the medical device adds the metadata.
 15. The computerimplemented method of claim 1 wherein a physician adds the metadata. 16.The computer implemented method of claim 1 further comprising encryptingthe secure item to prevent unauthorized access.
 17. The computerimplemented method of claim 1 wherein publishing the syndicated datafeed includes publishing the syndicated data feed to apublicly-accessible network.
 18. A computer implemented method,comprising: generating a syndicated data feed using a microprocessor ofthe computer executing instructions stored in a non-transitory computermemory that includes aggregated ultrasound echo data from a plurality ofmedical devices secured using a conditional access mechanism, thesyndicated data feed using a format selected from the group consistingof: Really Simple Syndication, Resource Description Framework SiteSummary, Rich Site Summary and Outline Processor Markup Language;publishing the syndicated data feed to a publicly-accessible networkusing the microprocessor of the computer executing instructions storedin a non-transitory computer memory; extracting information relating toan abnormality in the ultrasound echo data from the syndicated datafeed; extracting information relating to patient treatment data andpatient characteristics from the syndicated data feed; searching forabnormalities in the ultrasound echo data; comparing the extracted datarelated to the abnormality in the ultrasound data with comparableultrasound echo data from a normal specimen; and correlating theabnormalities in the ultrasound echo data with the patient treatmentdata.
 19. The computer implemented method of claim 18 further comprisingextracting information from the syndicated data feed, the informationselected from the group consisting of a virus, a virus parameter and anindication of a virus; and filtering the syndicated data feed based onthe extracted information.
 20. The computer implemented method of claim18 further comprising: subscribing to the syndicated data feed; andstoring the syndicated data feed in a data pool.
 21. The computerimplemented method of claim 20 further comprising accessing the datapool to obtain data for one or more of authorizing a medical procedureor authorizing payment for a medical procedure.
 22. The computerimplemented method of claim 18, further comprising adding metadata tothe ultrasound echo data in the syndicated data feed.
 23. The computerimplemented method of claim 22 wherein the metadata comprises metadataselected from the group consisting of metadata identifying the medicaldevice, metadata identifying a time of creation of the ultrasound echodata, metadata identifying a physician who requested the ultrasound echodata, metadata identifying a patient, metadata identifying an intendedrecipient of the ultrasound echo data, and metadata identifying alaboratory where the plurality of medical devices are located.
 24. Thecomputer implemented method of claim 10, further comprising addingmetadata to the secure item that includes at least one item of metadataselected from the group consisting of metadata identifying the medicaldevice, metadata identifying a time of creation of the ultrasound echodata, metadata identifying a physician who requested the ultrasound echodata, metadata identifying the patient, metadata identifying an intendedrecipient of the ultrasound echo data, and metadata identifying alaboratory where the medical device is located.